


A Whole New Life, If You Want It

by seademons



Category: Horizon: Zero Dawn (Video Game)
Genre: Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Explicit Sexual Content, F/M, Mutual Pining, Sexual Tension
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-04
Updated: 2017-06-26
Packaged: 2018-10-14 21:37:36
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 11
Words: 57,913
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10544746
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/seademons/pseuds/seademons
Summary: "If you're ever in Meridian, look me up. I could show you around, make introductions! It would be a whole new life... If you want it."What if, during the natural course of the game, Aloy had reciprocated Erend's advances? This work runs alongside the main canon quests, except with the rightful diversions of their relationship, and a lot of sex.





	1. The City of the Sun

What misfortune that her friend should lose his sister only a handful of days after she, too, had lost someone so deeply important to her. At the gates of Meridian, Erend looked absolutely devastated, slurring through his words and by some grand set of luck managing to stand on both feet, but despite his loss and the barreling responsibilities that unjustly accumulated over him, he seemed glad to see that Aloy had survived the attack at the Proving, even if she had been utterly lonely at that. One less corpse to the pile.

However busy and mournful he might have been when she arrived, it was out of his own good heart that he led her to the reason of her visit, the house of the traitor that knew more of what she so desperately grasped to understand. He kicked the door down and stood around, having been more than helpful enough on business that didn’t concern him, as she scanned the house for clues through her Focus. Erend had made it clear before to possess little knowledge of this technology, and from what she could notice it was out of lack of interest from his part rather than opportunity to learn, but that quickly changed when the Focus allowed her to acquire enough clues to move on, and similarly strike an idea in his mind. He asked after it, and all but begged her to use it in relation to his sister’s murder, so maybe the killer would be revealed, and Erend would have his revenge. His conscience would not be put to rest if such a bloodthirsty animal walked free for life, so Aloy considered. She knew that he meant those words, engraved in stone, and would do anything to find this person, no matter the cost or consequence, and maybe that was the biggest issue that pushed her to give him a noncommittal answer instead of a flat-out no. Because it wasn’t her business, and getting involved was always dangerous, but if Erend was willing to stupidly risk his life over it, then she might as well be present beside him to keep his drunk ass from hitting the ground.

Her hesitance didn’t strike a chord with him, and instead sent him storming out to the street, but still hoping to see her at Red Ridge Pass the next day. She hung back and mulled this over. Late War-Chief Ersa’s death was obviously a touchy subject, to him more than to anybody else, and any wrong deduction of the means of her killing, any careless slip or overlooked detail, could easily sever ties with Erend, which was a risk, but perhaps not showing face would be worse than making a mistake while trying. More treasonous, somehow, from not even sparing this cause a minute of her time. Aloy gave it more than just a thought as she ran various errands for the people of Meridian during the rest of the day, in an attempt to clear her mind of recurring trouble but finding it to be a more effort-demanding task than that. As the sun set and she galloped back to the settlement, a decision had been reached. Erend was in search of the truth, and answers, and as an advocate of both of those things, she would aid him through it. However he intended to deal with the results of this search was not of her concern.

Meridian was sure to have a sort of inn that she could stay at for the night, and while Aloy leisurely looked for it on foot, crossed paths with Erend once more, except this time by accident. A big grin graced his lips at her sight, so perhaps his spoiled humor had dissipated throughout the day. She offered a small smile in return, coming to a stop right before him. The streets were clearing out at this hour, not many people hanging about during nighttime, although businesses only seemed to grow more populated should they sell food and drink to their customers. From the looks of it, and the booming energy coming from the tavern not thirty feet away, she wouldn’t be surprised if Erend were on his way there. The heavy sway from earlier had lifted off his feet, so maybe that symbolized the right time for a retouch.

“Aloy! I’m happy to see you.” He greeted her as they met, his words surely genuine, and receiving a daring look in return, her slight smirk to go with it.

“I’m happy to see your good humor back in place.” She rose a brow near-absently and watched as his grin faltered, his eyes breaking contact for a quick moment to look visibly sheepish. It was a sight to see, but if Erend was to be hanging around her for a while, then he would wise up to her snark soon enough.

“Sorry about that, about earlier. I just… Lost control. I shouldn’t have used that tone with you. Finding Ersa’s murderer is my responsibility alone, and if you’d rather not get involved, I’d understand. This is not your obligation.”

“Too late, I’ve already made up my mind. And I’ll help you, if... You’ll still have me.” Her smile was softer now, coming up a match with the combined surprise and gratitude that passed through his eyes. His tenderness was heart-warming.

“Are you kidding? It’ll be my pleasure to have you. Honestly, thank you, Aloy. I’ll pay you back for this. If you ever need me, for anything at all, don’t hesitate to call. I’ll make sure to give you my best.”

“Like you demonstrated earlier, by kicking Olin’s door down? If I get involved in any more break-ins, I’ll surely get you on the case. But don’t worry, you did me a favor today and it’s only in my debt to do you one in return, so. Consider us even.” She shrugged, wearing a nonchalant smile that reassured him of the friendly agreement between the two of them. It was an exchange of favors that held differing depths of meaning to each, and yet could be set as equals. Erend nodded in reply, his grin only wider and his eyes shining in the dying light. Something about the way that he looked at her was… Nice. It made her feel important, for once included.

“Alright, fair enough. So are you doing anything tonight? Because I was on my way to the tavern and if you’d like a drink or two, it’ll be on me. I’d just really like your company.” He gestured vaguely toward the tavern while speaking, his eyes flicking over to it before resting back on her own. He looked well flustered, for some reason. It was almost cute. She wondered why such a harmless invitation seemed to be a struggle for him when asking for help with his sister’s murder came naturally.

“To be entirely honest, I don’t drink, but... Since all you want is my company, I’ll go with you. After all, _someone_ has to look after your drinking, and it certainly won’t be you.” She smiled at him again, at the well-natured half-smirk that he offered her in return. She knew the signs, and this was the beginning of his wisening up to her humor already. She only hoped that it would strengthen the bond between them.

The tavern was bursting with activity, filled up with chatter and drunken laughter that surprisingly catered to her, perhaps for its good humor and laid back enjoyment. All due to intoxication, but not that she cared for that. They took neighboring seats at the Vanguard table, Erend’s soldiers beckoning the two of them over with excessive gesturing and loud words that were sure to get their attention. They both sat down, two mugs filled with stout were pushed toward them and the men didn’t waste a second to fill them into their haphazard conversation. Much of what they talked about had to do with Oseram, their tribe, or were inside comments about one of their jobs, so pieces of certain topics were lost on her, but nothing major that kept her from missing the general concept of anything. She mostly listened in rather than added to the various conversations that went on around sectioned groups of soldiers, listened to the drunken plotting of revenge from one corner of the table, the incomprehensible blabber from the other corner, the numerous cursing of the Shadow Carja from one side and the sing-song teasing from the other, about the two of them sitting next to each other, and her having walked in accompanying Erend. Of course, her attention was mostly turned to the latter, since it involved her directly, but not negatively in any way. In fact, it was very lighthearted and fun, because it was directed at Erend rather than at her, and only made her laugh while he grew increasingly embarrassed. He dismissed anything that his men said with a shake of the head or a couple of quick words intended to shut them up, but not that it worked, or that he expected it to, and Aloy found herself partial to the soldiers. Her cheeks soon began to ache from how wide she had been grinning.

As the night progressed and the men around her only grew drunker, the changing topics floating from mouth to mouth started to speak the same thought on the back of everyone’s minds, as if reawakening a passion inside of them to fight for the delivery of Ersa’s justice. That pushed them all to curse the Shadow Carja more fiercely, and plot more thoroughly, or as thoroughly as their alcoholized brains led them to believe, but not that Erend had joined in on it. Instead, he became quiet, and his eyes focused on the thick mug before him, causing the space around him to grow somber and detached. Aloy couldn’t help but notice this change, as it happened right beside her, and made a point to keep an eye on her friend, should he get any more worrying. While the men put together the most flawed plan of attack in the history of the Vanguard, Erend knocked back mug after mug, not saying a single word or paying any of them any mind. Aloy only watched, unsure of how to proceed, and if intervening would be appropriate at all, given that they had only met twice, but when Erend got up from his seat for whatever reason, she knew that it was her single chance to get him out of there. He stood up, and swayed, and leaned on the table for balance, so she followed, standing beside him on both feet and making him look at her.

“I’m only getting ale from the bar, Aloy, don’t worry. I’ll be back in a second.” His speech wasn’t as slurred as she honestly thought it would be from how much he had drunk throughout the night, but that wasn’t to say that he couldn’t use of an intervention. She smiled evasively and sided by him, closing the gap between them with a sly step. The curious interest on his face was strangely delightful.

“Can I come with?” They were close enough that her whisper found no trouble registering in his head and causing his eyes to flick down to her lips for the fraction of a second. It was an out of place reaction, unlike any that she had seen before, but he was drunk, and that was probably just a result from it, not meaning a thing.

“Sure.”

Erend nodded curtly, turning his head to glance across the tavern at the bar, and giving her the perfect opening for hooking an arm around his waist, forcing him toward the front door instead. He was expectedly heavy, and his lack of balance coupled with the surprise didn’t give her any advantage on the grapple, but it didn’t mean that she was any less successful at it. She got him walking to the opposite direction of the bar with a heavy arm across her shoulders and perplexed eyes glued to the side of her face. She didn’t dare meet them, or all of her resolution would be gone in an instant, replaced by embarrassment.

Outside, he stopped her. It only took him two boots flat on the ground and one strong tug on her shoulder to cancel out inertia. Moving him was like moving a boulder, and this was the foot of the hill. She turned to fully look at him, still holding his waist with a hand, which he didn’t seem to mind.

“What are you doing?” His gruff voice complemented the scowl on his forehead, both of which caused her cheeks to burn from being figured out. She grabbed the armor of his waist harder, as if a foothold to keep her standing.

“Getting you out of here.”

At her response, the clear annoyance on his face faded out into something else, something more curious and inquiring that calmed her down. He was listening, and interested, which thankfully allowed her to explain herself further.

“You seemed… Unhappy in there, Erend, and I was worried that you weren’t in your right mind to consider leaving. I might be completely wrong, but you don’t look… Alright. Are you?”

“I will be.” He ran a gloved hand over his head, fingers brushing the mohawk back as he sighed, eyes cast aside at the street. His sister’s death fell heavily on him, that was obvious, and however strong he might’ve been, a friendly shoulder or two were sure to lift some of that burden off, or at least make it easier to carry. Aloy only hoped to be of some help rather than the opposite.

“I’m sure of that. Hey.” She stepped closer to him, resting a palm on the studded leather armor that covered his chest and catching his eye again. “Can I walk you home?” She wasn’t sure if he lived in Meridian, but from their first conversation one day before the Proving, he had mentioned to be staying here, or something along those lines, that pushed her to make the assumption. From the smile that her question got in return, she might not have been that far off at all.

“If it’ll help you stop worrying about me.” He grinned, somehow making her mirror it with one of her own as they started across the plaza, his feet heavy on the ground with each step and her arm firmly across his waist, gripping him close, but not that it’d stop him from falling face-first on his right side.

“Ah, I don’t think anything will.” She smiled up at him, enjoying the weight of his arm around the back of her neck and the heat radiating off his body from this close.

Houses in Meridian, in general, from what she could’ve seen, were absolutely beautiful. From the detailed carvings on the mahogany to the intricate designs of the tapestry, the Meridian lifestyle was nothing short of posh, which was impressive for a society that lived in constant war against deadly machines roaming just outside of the settlement walls. If she thought that Olin’s house was too big for a family of two and a child, then Erend’s house was perfectly overindulgent for a single man. Perhaps two siblings in the past, but even so, still far too spacious for that. Well kept, beautifully decorated, and extremely unnecessary. He invited her in as they arrived, and she originally wasn’t going to, but he was still stumbling over his own feet and, probably, lonely from the loss of his sister, so she let herself in and looked around the foyer as he locked the door behind them. It felt… Weird to be in his house, alone with him, but much stranger things had happened in her life. Perhaps this odd feeling was due to her lack of friends while growing up, and Erend was her first real one. Maybe the strangeness was because she wasn’t used to it.

“You know, I’m glad that you’re here. In Meridian, I mean, even if it’s not because of me. It’s because of Olin. But I’m glad that you showed up at all. I, uh.” Erend paused and motioned vaguely, drifting his eyes off of her for a moment, either losing the point of his speech or deciding against elaborating it further, and proceeding to promptly change the subject instead. “Uh, this is where I live. Do you want to see upstairs?” There was something in his coy smile, in the glint of his eye, as he asked the question that she couldn’t identify exactly what it was, or what it meant. If it changed anything. It was something that made the question sound like a joke but actually be meant as a legitimate one, awaiting a real answer, so she answered. She shrugged, and smiled, and said that sure, she’d love to see it. The heat across his cheeks worsened, probably from the brew, but she decided not to mention it as he led her up the stairs and into a big landing, lavishly decorated from top to bottom, much alike the foyer. Enormous bookshelves lined the walls and thick, Persian rugs covered the floors where a heavy mahogany desk, a coffee table and a few chairs rested, decorated by wooden figures, potted plants and candelabra peppered all over. The rugs must’ve cost a pretty penny if they truly were from the age of the Old Ones; their texture and design indicated as much. Aloy leaned on the heavy desk and removed her boots to properly feel the softness of the rugs on her soles. Erend only grinned at the sight.

“Are they authentic?” She asked.

“Huh, I don’t know. Probably not.” Erend spared the expanse of flooring a thoughtless glance before continuing past the desk and further into the hall, with Aloy in tow. She noticed the lack of doors on this level, there only being two across from each other, one on each side of the room, while downstairs were at least three doors and two archways, certainly leading into different sections and wings of the place. Something important had gotten its own floor upstairs.

“So, what’s the great thing up here that you wanted me to see?” Her question prompted the return of Erend’s sly smile as he crossed the landing to one of the doors and pushed it open for her. She caught his eye before coming to a stop beside him, just outside of the doorway.

“My bedroom.” The grin on his face didn’t match the low monotone of his voice, but perhaps it was part of a gag that must’ve flown right over her head. He looked mischievous, so she didn’t go in right away. That, and also because a person’s bedroom was a highly private place that she probably shouldn’t be in, unless… Unless. She looked at him again, trying to read him, trying to see some ulterior motive on his face, but all he offered was an eyebrow raised back at her, surely trying to figure her out in return, and why she stalled to go in.

If she went in, she’d be committing to something, and she wasn’t sure that she wanted this commitment to be with Erend. She had never been with anyone before, always happily single and too stacked up with errands to pay men--or women--any mind, at least not _this_ kind of mind, but she’d be lying to say that she had never considered it, or thought about it. Not with Erend, anyway, but then again, why not with Erend? Assuming that his intentions were such, which they might as well not have been. It was a risk that she decided was worth taking, whether anything romantic happened or not, she was now curious to know, and experience something new. It couldn’t be all bad, Erend was too sweet to spoil it. She walked in before him and dumped her boots at the foot of the bed, taking a moment to appreciate the moonlight filtering in through the windows and lighting up most of the mattress, the covers and pillows in glistening silver. There was no sound of the door closing behind her, only Erend’s footfalls meandering to one side of the room, so he had left it open, and she had an escape route, just in case, which was reassuring.

She sat on the edge of the bed and finally peeled her eyes away from the sky, instead looking again at Erend, watching him remove and put aside his armor. She was… Surprised… At herself, at how much she actually enjoyed that, if she was even supposed to have looked at all, given that he stripped right in front of her, but then again, this was still his room, and _she_ was the intruder. The armor had been removed, along with the boots and the gloves, leaving only the shirt and pants to cover his body. The shirt was baggy on the arms, stripped white and orange, while the center hugged his torso rather snuggly, causing her eyes to glue to his chest, for a deliberate moment, before she looked back up at him, and watched as he walked over, taking a seat beside her on the mattress. Her heart leapt for her throat when he caught her eye, not even doing a thing, not yet, while she struggled to not let the anticipation, the expectation, get the best of her and wreck her nerves. He was just sitting next to her, looking at her, as she did the exact same back at him, but only with a heart hammering her ribcage to pieces.

Erend’s eyes dropped to her lips, but this time, it made sense. It also got her wondering if their closeness at the tavern had nearly pushed him to kiss her, right there, in front of the entire Vanguard, had the idea not been trashed by his inebriated brain before he got a chance at it. Would she have kissed him back? In all honesty, probably not. But now, as he leaned in closer and pressed his lips to hers, she did. She had never kissed before, and the softness of his lips was something that she would never have guessed, although the feeling of his mustache on her upper lip was well expected. Erend placed a hand on the side of her face, fingers brushing her hair and touching her neck the more he leaned in. She watched his lashes rest against the paleness of his cheek before deciding to close her own eyes as well, and experience this as he was. After all, the chances of him having been with someone before were higher than hers, so he probably knew what he was doing, saving the two of them, and she’d follow his lead. He parted his lips and licked at hers, which she took in stride, mirroring after him as best she could. Unsurprisingly, he tasted of stout, but not that she minded. She didn’t like beer but the taste of it on his tongue was incredibly addicting.

Erend continued to lean in, straining the arm that she was using for support, hand planted firmly on the mattress to keep her sitting, so she placed her free one on the crook of his neck to push him back, but he was faster than her. He gave her elbow a firm tap that bent it, and caused her to fall back on the bed, her free hand trying to grab the side of his neck on impulse to save the fall but only scratching the skin instead. It must’ve hurt, but Erend was only grinning, seemingly not minding the sting of her nails at all.

“You…” She slit her eyes up at him in mock bloodthirst, which only made him laugh and move to lay above her. Not exactly lay his entire weight on her, though, keeping from crushing her with a forearm on the bed, but above her enough for their stomachs to rest together. She found that she liked this arrangement, something about a fraction of his weight sinking her into the mattress being comfortable to her. Their lips locked, her hands found his face and his hands found her body. She ran her fingers through his beard, and to the back of his head, and through the mohawk, while his palm gripped her waist and warmed her skin right through her clothes.

As they kissed, something flourished in her chest, a warm feeling that brought a smile to her lips. By all means, it was a good one, and a feeling that she wouldn’t mind getting more of, wherever it came from. She sighed into his mouth, content, and could feel his smile against her lips, multiplying her contentment. He broke the kiss to pepper her jawline and neck with a variety of them instead, firm ones that left the feeling of his mustache on her skin even after it had left it. She couldn’t help but grin and take this as an opportunity to touch his milky neck, and collarbone, and slip fingers under the collar of his shirt. He nipped at her jaw before letting it be and moving to sit up, or really kneel up, with knees intertwining hers. She had never noticed how big his thighs were, or how wide his body was, thick and bulky at the sides, with complementary biceps and forearms. He took his shirt off, and her jaw could’ve fucking dropped. Erend was… A sight to see. He tossed the shirt aside and too soon moved to lay back down, so she stopped him halfway with a hand to his stomach. It was so firm, but at the same time soft, that she had to bring another hand into this clearly scientific experiment for further analysis. She ran her palms up his stomach and around his sides, stopping just short of sinking her nails in his skin. Not sure where that sudden urge had come from, but she made sure to kill it before it got any bigger. Erend only looked at her, a little confused, but mostly entertained at whatever this was. She smiled up at him, and he sank back down on top of her, diving for a kiss.

His hand found the inside of her shirt, and touched the skin of her flat stomach with a burning palm. Everything about Erend was so warm that a kiss from him set her whole face on fire. He ran a hand up to her ribs, just below her breasts, where she stopped him, by grabbing his wrist and pushing his hand back down. He didn’t seem to mind that, didn’t break the kiss to say anything, only moved down instead, at her request, far enough to come across the strap of her belt. He tried to unbuckle it with a single hand unassisted, so she let him, not at all minding her skirt to be taken off. It wasn’t comfortable to lay on, anyway. It took him a minute, but he managed to undo it and pull it from underneath her, as she raised her hips to help. She might’ve raised them too far, though, because they found his, and bumped into them, making him crack a grin against her lips. She liked that a lot. With the skirt gone, tossed carelessly off the side of the bed, he sunk back down on her, his hips meeting hers on purpose now, and making her eyes shoot open. What a feeling, to have him pressed so close to her. She never thought that she’d get to feel something like it. What a surprise, too, even if she didn’t have what to compare him to.

She had a knee up, for no other reason than that it was comfortable laying this way, and Erend took that to his advantage, running a palm along the curve of her ass and finding the underside of her thigh. She almost punched him in the face, but didn’t have the heart to break such a nice kiss just for that. He brought her leg up further and ground down on her, shamelessly sinking her into the mattress, causing her to gasp into his mouth and grab him by the shoulders. This was weird, and insane, but at the same time strangely welcome. He huffed once, hot on her face, as their hips collided, and the more they did, the more something built up inside of her. It felt… Good, to have him this close, to feel him against the low of her stomach, kissing her so hard that her lips started to ache, and she wanted to give him something back. That, and her curiosity was simply killing her, so she did what she had had in mind for a minute, and reached down between them, running her palm along his stomach as she went, until it slipped under the hem of his pants, and made him stop grinding. She reached further down and closed a hand around his cock, squeezing it a bit, just because. Just to see what happened. Her eyes were wide open, and watched as he furrowed his brows, eyes shut closed, and muffled a noise against her lips in response. She liked, no, _loved_ how much sloppier his kissing became the more she squeezed along the shaft, coming up to the head, and squeezing that, too. He was whiny, muffling everything on her skin as she touched him, to the point that he was tugging on her lips more than rightly kissing her then. She pressed a thumb to the head and circled it, swiped at it, her nail finding the slit and making him outright groan in her mouth. The hand that he had on her thigh squeezed it, putting a smile on her face.

He reached down as well and grabbed her hand, closing it tight around himself as his hips resumed thrusting, this time hard into her palm. It was pretty fitting that this was technically the first time he had ever held her hand. She went along with his idea and kept her wrist in position just as he had shown, so he let go, and this time grabbed her naked waist instead of her clothed thigh. They weren’t even kissing anymore, his face pressed to the side of hers instead, breathing heavily against her jaw and muffling noises there, too. His hips soon started to pick up pace, a very predictable one that got her thinking, and scheming, and considering. She kept her wrist in place for a while, then gradually started stroking down just as he pushed up, in meeting, squeezing on the upstroke, and causing him to moan, or groan, a blending of the two, that filled her chest with wicked pride. She jerked him as he fucked her hand and she had never felt so connected to anyone before. Were the bed any less richly stable, it’d be shaking enough to damage the wall. It still shook, but not nearly as violently as it could have.

In time, his hips started to lower, and quicken, making so that the tip of his cock brushed her navel, and she could feel the precum on her fingers dripping down to her stomach. This seemed to be amounting to something, so she made her wrist work faster to stay in tempo with his thrusts, and enjoyed the loud panting and gasping from him that easily filled the room. She turned her head until her lips met with his jaw and kissed him there.

“Fuck.” He breathed into her neck, his hips suddenly halting all movement and going still. “Aloy, stop.”

His words confused her, but she did as told, without needing him to snatch her forearm away, which he did, anyway. She tried to look at him, but his face was too far into the crook of her neck for that. He just stayed there, panting and doing nothing else for a quick minute, before moving back to kiss her. It wasn’t sweet like she, for some reason, thought it’d be, but more like crushing his lips into hers as his hand found the waistband of her pants and yanked it down. That caught her completely by surprise. She tensed up, and out of absolute instinct, snatched his hand off of her, with enough force to break a gash on his skin. That made him pull back to give her a look, eyes blown wide at the surprise. Not angry, just bewildered that she would draw blood from him so randomly, at a time like this. Suddenly, she felt constricted, claustrophobic underneath him, crushed by his weight, and needed, at all costs, to get out and breathe, so she braced an arm across his chest and used her other elbow for leverage, to push him off without much trouble, although much effort, given how heavy he was. He rolled off without resistance as she slipped out of the bed and started to pull her shirt down and her pants up, covering her stomach on her way to the door.

Erend grabbed her wrist before she made it out. “Wait, Aloy, what happened? Look, I’m sorry, just. Don’t leave. Please.” He looked hurt, and she couldn’t bear keep her eyes on him. She felt strange, freaked out, and just needed to get away for a moment. She wouldn’t leave the house, wouldn’t leave him alone for the night, she could never do that, but she needed to breathe.

“I’m only going downstairs, Erend. I… Need this.” She looked at him then, boring right into his big blue eyes how much she meant those words, so he let her go. Hesitantly, but his hold on her wrist slowly loosened until he completely removed his hand from her without another word. It broke her heart a little, but she was very grateful for his lack of persistence. She left and hopped down the staircase barefoot, scuttling through the foyer to the first room in sight that wasn’t closed off by a door, only an archway. For some reason, a closed off wing would only make her feel worse, even if it wasn’t locked. Walking in, the settee by the wall seemed just perfect to lay down and curl up and calm down. She hugged herself, her long hair framing the side of her face that didn’t rest on the cushion, the world turned sideways for a while. She took a deep breath in, then out, and rested, her eyes not falling closed, but not registering any of the beautiful furniture hidden half into the shadows, and half out into the moonlight, either.

She honestly couldn’t tell how long she had stayed there, until her ears picked up the sound of Erend’s heavy footfalls carefully descending the stairs. She didn’t move, only stayed quiet, listening in and trying to imagine him, all broad chest and square shoulders, coming down to check on her.

“Aloy?” His voice drifted from the foyer, soft like the wind, surely not trying to wake her in case she had fallen asleep. She smiled into the empty room, not responding but moving to a sitting position on the settee, should he come in and find her. If he didn’t, she might’ve gone to him instead. “Aloy?” He called again, just as softly, half-heartedly searching in the neighboring rooms before reaching where she was. He had a shirt back on, which was a bit of a disappointment, but other than that, her memory had been on point. He let out a breath, visibly glad that she had kept her word and not ran off into the night. She redirected the smile at him, choosing to stay quiet, so he did the talking.

“Hey… Are you okay? I’m sorry if I…” He gestured vaguely with a hand, trying to find the right word to continue. “Sorry if I was too forward with you. I didn’t mean to scare you off or anything.” Erend didn’t come into the room, instead he stayed by the archway, watching her figure under the moonlight and talking quietly, not to disturb the night. “I hope we can talk about this.”

The lung-squeezing feeling from before that had left her shaking had long dissipated, now being replaced by more of that warm and soothing nature from earlier, much earlier, from in the middle of their kissing, when she thought that, maybe, they had a deeper connection than a simple friendship. She shook her head, still wearing the same calm smile that she had just greeted him with.

“Don’t worry, Erend, I’m the one who should be apologizing to you. I don’t know what happened, really, but I’m okay. Hopefully you’re not too mad at me for running off like a coward?” It was more of a playful question than anything, only to ease some of the seriousness off of the atmosphere for the moment. The last thing she wanted was for the two of them to be uncomfortable around each other, not now that something deeper was just starting to bloom. Erend shook his head at once, taking a step into the room but otherwise staying close to the archway.

“No, of course not. I was afraid it was actually the opposite, you being mad at me.”

“Nope, not at all. Like it or not, you’re still my friend, who… I didn’t get to finish.”

Even partially hidden in shadow, it wasn’t difficult to make out the color of his face, not with the sheepish look that accompanied it, making her grin. He ran a hand through the mohawk, shrugging dismissively at her concerns.

“You’ll get plenty of opportunity for that later, so don’t lose sleep over it. Which reminds me, if you’d rather spend the night down here, there are a few guest rooms that you can choose from. I can show you where they are.”

“What’s the other option?”

“We can share my bed. Nothing more than just share it, honest.” He brought a palm up to his chest at that, as if swearing oath to his word, but not that he needed to, because she believed him. Of course she believed him. Aloy got up from the settee and walked over to him, to slip both arms around his waist and pull him into a hug. For no reason at all, it only hit her as something that she wanted to do, and had been meaning to for some time, since early this evening, when the Vanguard united conversation about his sister. She hugged him tight, and took this minute to bury her face on his collarbone, where his scent was stronger and the scratch on his neck remained. He hugged her back, but tenderly, as if afraid to snap her in half, although there was something else. Something sentimental, something brooding that she couldn’t identify. It was warm, and appreciated, whatever it was. She kissed the scratch on his neck before pulling away from him, enough to look him in the eye.

“I like that idea.”


	2. The Field of the Fallen

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TW: Nil.

By morning, she bid Erend goodbye, for now, intended to head to the excavation site where Olin surely was, and interrogate him. She’d meet with Erend at Red Ridge Pass later on, which also gave him time to nurse the hangover that seemed to be killing him, nothing short of splitting his head right open. She got dressed and kissed his forehead on her way out, wishing him a fast recovery for later in the day. It was different, this closeness between them, something so casual and yet so strikingly present that she was in no way used to, but welcomed it with open arms. Erend seemed to be taking all of this in stride, as if he had experienced it before, and she had no doubt of that being true. It didn’t bother her, though, not a bit. She was still new to all of this after all, and wasn’t even sure that she’d be sticking around to see the end of it. For the moment, she’d explore this some more, and only later decide whether or not she liked it enough to see it through.

The excavation site was crawling with cultists and machines, but it didn’t strictly require much effort to take them all down on the way to Olin, who oddly seemed to be on her side at the moment. If he killed a cultist or two during the few hours that she worked through the site, bringing down both man and machine alike, she didn’t notice, too busy caring for her own life in order to survive. At last, dozens of corpses later, they met at the bottom, him on the floor and her with a spear to his throat. She was angry, fuming, but at the wrong person. He wasn’t an evil mastermind, he wasn’t behind any of this. In fact, he had been used by the Shadow Carja, his family held captive as “incentive” to get him working in their favor. Under her spear, he managed to tell her some of the highly valuable information that she had journeyed far to know. He told her of the Eclipse, their plans, the Devil that they worshipped, and the man that had held a knife to her throat, the man responsible for the death of her dearest friend, the man that the Eclipse called Helis. Olin knew much of the Shadow Carja, but didn’t, however, know anything of the woman that she had been looking for, the woman so similar to her that All-Mother’s recognition system nearly mistook one for the other. This woman… Perhaps her own true mother… Was the sole reason of her perilous journey outside of the Embrace at all, and if she could get her hands on Helis on the way, vendetta would never have been sweeter. Olin said that she could find out more about her mother in the ruins of Maker’s End, so she made a point to ride up there after settling all business in Meridian.

At last, she dropped the spear, and spared the life of an innocent man who had been wronged. He thanked her thoroughly, and even more so after she promised to help him rescue his wife and children. What the Shadow Carja had done to him was completely unfair, by all means disgusting, and she’d try to help in any way that she could. He thanked her, and they parted ways, scheduling to meet later this afternoon.

On her way back to the settlement, Aloy accidentally came across Red Ridge Pass, where Erend was engaged in combat against a few Grazers, surely waiting for her. He didn’t look to be in real trouble, easily handling those machines with the hammer, but she stepped in to make him company either way, and have fun more than anything. The Grazers were dismantled and their pieces were scattered about in no time, and for a minute, this spot would be free of them. Erend huffed, putting the hammer away on his back while greeting her, and stopping a moment to really explain to her what had happened to his sister. Apparently, Ersa had left in the middle of the night with a few of her best men, and got ambushed not too far from where they were. The reason why she hadn’t taken Erend, neither of them knew, but it had a deep impact on him, nearly causing him to blame himself for her death. He sounded absolutely broken while speaking of her, and Aloy couldn’t help but feel a tinge of guilt the more she questioned him about it, but if he wanted her to help track the murderers, possibly the Shadow Carja, then she’d need to know everything that he could tell her, even if that wasn’t a joyful topic to discuss. He stepped back and pointed a thumb to indicate somewhere behind him.

“The ambush happened over this way, so come on.”

Before he left, she stopped him, just for a second. Just to make sure of something. She grabbed his upper arm, making him look at her, and stared right into his pair of light blues, easily reading the sincerity off of them.

“Are you alright?”

Her question was whispered, but not on purpose, only because it mirrored how she felt, how soft her careful nature thought of him in that moment. He searched her eyes, picking up on the seriousness of the question, and nodded, solemnly, this time not trying to lighten up the atmosphere with a joke. She continued to stare him down, just in case he wasn’t being entirely transparent, but there was nothing short of honesty in his answer, so she let him go, and followed close behind as he led her to the site.

The ambush location was very obviously staged, with unused arrows scattered about and cart tracks rut in the dirt. It didn’t take long before they were both running up the narrow path leading a few feet up the mountain to some ancient ruins, where the real ambush had happened with Ersa, and now, again, but with the two of them, although she couldn’t say that it was particularly surprising. What was surprising, however, was the lack of Shadow Carja, and instead soldiers of Erend’s own tribe, the Oseram, were up in the rafters and down at the makeshift arena to face them. Erend didn’t hesitate to slaughter the melee fighters as Aloy shot the snipers down, though, and if he seemed heartbroken for a second there, it dissipated at the first swing. They worked strikingly well together, and when the Oseram realized this, released a couple of machines to their own aid, even though that only served to prolong their inevitable end. With the machines down and all of the men killed, Erend’s feelings weren’t of betrayal, but disgust and self-disappointment for not having figured this out before. To his credit, none of the people that had been sent to the faux-ambush site for examination realized that it was fake in the first place, so why would he doubt them? He had no reason to.

After further sleuthing of the arena, the clues all seemed to piece together a theory of Ersa still being alive, but of course only if Aloy had hit her logical thinking right on the nail, which she could bet her everything on it. When she told Erend about that, his face lit up bright as all hope returned to him. The helmet of his sister’s that he had found as she searched, being clutched to his chest, now more of a good omen than memorabilia. Aloy asked him to have another look at the corpse back in Meridian, believed to be Ersa’s, and if he could find any proof that it wasn’t his sister, then they’d continue on with the investigation. In case that it was, undoubtedly, her, then, obviously it would all end here. Erend jumped up to his feet and already started the journey back to Meridian, with high spirits and an excited rush to his step. He asked if she’d follow, but she had unfinished business with Olin, and would meet Erend at the settlement later on.

The Shadow Carja had completely taken over Olin’s house, settled in far too many men, far more than necessary, to keep an untrained woman and a child from running off. It was absurd, it was overkill to have the lot swarming with armed soldiers only to remain guard by the door. Aloy was disgusted with the cruelty, and poor Olin had been devastated for weeks, possibly even months. They hid in the tall grass nearest his estate and sniped down some of the soldiers, to the point that Olin couldn’t control himself anymore, and ran in, bashing people’s helmets in and getting himself bathed in blood. Aloy didn’t condemn him at all, his anger being well justified, and only accompanied him to make sure that he wouldn’t get outnumbered. Which he did, but not that it posed much trouble for the two of them. They took care of every single Shadow Carja, ripped off the key from one of them, and released his wife and child from captivity. The family reunited so beautifully that tears blurred Aloy’s vision, although refusing to fall. She watched from the door, and approached them when Olin motioned for her to. They thanked her dearly, and even gave her a little something as a token of appreciation, which they honestly didn’t have to. The image of the entire family teary-eyed and hugging was enough of a reward to last her a lifetime.

The sun had already set by the time Aloy started the journey back to Meridian, on the back of a Broadhead to make it less tiresome. She watched the stars appear above her, the gorgeous view presented to her resonating with the warm feeling in the center of her chest. She wondered what it was like to have a family like that of Olin’s, a pair of parents to guide and protect the child as they grew and shaped into themselves. Sure, Rost raised her into the fighter that she was today, and cared for her and watched after her, but he wasn’t her biological father, and she didn’t have a single female role model to teach her to be a woman. They were outcasts, shunned from the Nora tribe, and she essentially grew up alone, with only him by her side. It hurt to remember him, her greatest friend, but all of his memories were fond ones, and made her smile through the pain.

To ruin her mood, a few miles before reaching Meridian’s gates, Nil came across her path with another one of his bloodthirsty adventures. He spotted her from the sidelines of a bandit camp, and quickly approached her, as the Broadhead meandered and had a jolly stroll rather than galloped at full speed to her destination. Enjoying the nice weather almost felt like a mistake now.

“Aloy! Good timing.”

Nil came up to her side and touched the Broadhead to catch her attention, so she made the machine halt for a polite conversation, however unpleasant she already knew it was going to be. Nil had a wicked smirk on his face that almost made her speed away instead of sit and talk, but she hopped off the machine despite herself, her good heart speaking louder than the rest.

“Hey, Nil. Another bandit camp, I presume?”

“You know it.” He grinned wider, looking manic, as if she wasn’t already certain that he was a crazy person. “I’m glad you showed up. Taking over these camps is much more fun beside you.” The unfaltering glee on his face would be hilarious if he weren’t taking such immeasurable joy from the murder of others, however justified it was, and socially beneficial. Bandits stole for profit, terrorized, killed and took away hostages. They were, by all means, evil, but that wasn’t the reason of Nil’s incessant hunting of them. He just wanted to murder, he _enjoyed_ that, the bloodbaths, the panic, he loved all of it, and the only reason why he went after bandits at all was because they wouldn’t cause him trouble afterwards. The killing en masse of terrible men and women never posed consequence from the state. In fact, it was rather appreciated. Aloy shook her head, rolling her eyes at his splitting grin, but way past feeling sick about his motives. She took out her bow and took a step forward, showing her disposition to accompany him through this mess once again.

“I scoped out the area while you were on the way over. They have two main entrances, one here, and one directly across from here.” He whispered to her as they started for the first entrance that he spoke of, pointing at it, and at the lookouts up in the watchtowers. Aloy crouched and mingled with the tall grass for a good sniping spot, Nil in tow.

“I wasn’t on my way over, I was actually going somewhere else.” She bit back in a hush, barely sparing him a glance before readying an arrow at the lookout’s forehead. “But here we are anyway, so go on. Are we sticking together?” She fired the arrow, effectively taking out the lookout without a single sound, except for the gruntled choke that left the man as he fell dead. Nil didn’t bat an eye at it, accustomed to her deadly accuracy by now.

“No, soon I’ll creep round to the back, and clear a path toward the center. You do the same on this side, and when you free the hostages, that will be the signal to really start the fight.”

“Why don’t _you_ free the hostages?” She knew the answer to this, but asked anyway, to hear it, and have a vocalized reason to be annoyed at him. Which she already was, but justifying that feeling would help her feel further righteous about it. She glanced at him instead of taking out the second lookout, because the eye roll on his face was too golden to miss, and put a smirk on her lips.

“You’re the one who cares about them, Aloy, you know that. You know I’m only here for the fun of it, for the circus, the hunt. This is the main attraction. Will you snipe down that man before he notices that his buddy’s been killed? Yes, good. Nice shot. You have a good eye, good enough to be my new partner.” He smirked at her with piercing eyes that almost got her pointing an arrow right between them, but she only shook her head, and took down an approaching bandit instead. Not as fulfilling, but the only available target at the moment.

“I’m not your partner, Nil, I’m unfortunately stuck to you. There’s a difference.” She moved to change spots, and hide in a patch of tall grass closer to the entrance, with a better view of the dead body just by the gates, sure to attract attention over, where she could snipe their heads clean off. Nil continued to follow.

“There doesn’t have to be.” His voice was suggestive enough that she didn’t need to tear attention away from the camp entrance to know that he was smirking, again. She rolled her eyes to herself, readying an arrow for the next victim, who worriedly approached the dead man.

“No, but there is, so don’t get your hopes up.” She watched the arch intently, and sniped the very first person that wandered by it, causing a few bandits that saw this to go suspicious, and start searching the area. It was time to lay low, if only for half a second. If anyone should poke their heads into her field of vision, she’d wait for them to be alone to shoot.

“Our chance encounters are always striking experiences, more fun than I care to admit, so I’ll take what I can get. If you don’t want to accompany me from camp to camp, that’s fine. I know you have other businesses to attend to, like overriding machines, assassinating on demand and, apparently, hitting camps without me? I stopped by Two Teeth a while ago to take it on, but it had already become a nice village by the time I got there. You play dirty, Aloy. Either that, or we happen to share a hobby. Which one is it?”

She grinned, her eyes trained on the back of a bandit’s head before she hit it with an arrow. “Guess I’m not a very good team player.” She didn’t spare Nil a single look, only listened to his snort and the rustling of the grass around him as he began to leave.

“That’s too bad, we work so well together. But if you try to overtake this camp on your own, I will turn on you. This is just a warning. Don’t forget the signal.”

Nil left her side, sneaking from this patch of grass to the next until his silhouette melted with the shadows in the dark. Aloy huffed out her annoyance, using the slowly-rising anger in her favor to take out more appearing bandits. “That sounded more like a threat.” She whispered to herself, shooting arrow after arrow the more people showed up, then finally taking a break, or her cover would be blown. Bandits started leaving the camp in search of her, which both greatly unnerved her but also allowed her a few opportunities for silent takedowns that worked in her favor.

All in all, it took her a minute, but she managed to make it safe to enter the camp and hide without the alarm being touched. This new spot allowed her to peer further into the camp, at the very central atrium of it, where the alarm, a campfire and some patrols were located. The hostages were just past them, and the only way she could get to them without ringing the alarm would be sneaking from grass to grass during open patrolling intervals. She waited a minute before starting with that plan, though, just in case Nil hadn’t cleared out a good path toward the center yet. He _was_ late, after all, chit-chatting beside her for far too long. He was a goddamn loudmouth, that was true. She sat still for a moment, and when every patrol’s movement was engraved in her mind, she started to inch toward the signal. It was nerve-wracking, she had almost been caught once or twice, barely managing to duck into the grass before being spotted, but eventually arriving at the cells, and cutting the hostages free. They immediately jumped into combat, so she followed, keeping an eye out for Nil. Which she didn’t have to, because he almost started a fight before her.

“What took you so long?” He asked her while side-stepping away from the swing of a sword. She glared at him and stuck her spear deep into a man’s back, his painful scream drowned out by the sounds of the battle.

“I wanted to make sure that you were ready!” Her shout reached him over the noise, making him smirk as he stuck a dagger under a bandit’s arm, and twisted it, reveling in the man’s pain. She frowned at that, fortunately too busy with her own swings to really think it over too much.

“I’m always ready.” Nil yelled back at her, then went off to fight alongside the hostages, sure to get blood spilled all over himself. She shook her head and focused back on the immediate threats in front of her, mind quick to get far as away from Nil as possible.

When combat was over, and the camp had been cleared, the hostages left, and the two of them absently met back in the center, by the campfire. Nil lit it as she sat down by it and leaned back on her hands, allowing breath to come back to her lungs and her heart rate to drop back to normalcy. He joined her, laughing, but not that she knew the reason for it, nor that she wanted to. She just looked at him funny, then back at the fire, her eyes entranced by the dancing flames. Nil shifted beside her to lay on his back, face up at the stars, when a thought hit her suddenly, head on like a Trampler.

“Have you ever loved?”

The question left her lips before she had fully registered it, unsure of where it had come from, unsure of where it would lead her. She glanced at him, and felt as shocked as he looked to be. He didn’t answer, only stared, and perhaps that by itself was its own answer.

“That’s a strange thing to ask someone you barely know.” He had a brow arched, surely in oddity, but otherwise remained comfortably lying down on the dirt as he was, with a feet propped up against a knee. He was obviously bothered by the question, even if his posture didn’t show it. “I’m not even sure that I can answer you. I _like_ you, if that’s what you’re looking for.”

“No. No, I don’t know what I’m looking for, if anything at all. I was just… Wondering.”

“Why, have you?”

“No. I've been an outcast for as long as I can remember, not allowed to speak with any Nora or leave the Embrace, so I guess... I just didn’t have an opportunity to feel something like that.”

Nil looked at her. She could feel his stare boring on the side of her face offered to him, and decided to keep it that way. Whatever he was thinking of her, she wasn’t sure that she really wanted to know.

“What do you want from me?” His voice was soft, like she had never heard out of him before, and for some reason, that sent chills down her spine and along her arms. She pulled her knees closer, hugging them to her chest while shrugging, eyes on the flames and never on him.

“I don’t know what you mean.” Her words were directed at the fire, but it made him move to sit up anyway. She knew that, if she met his eyes, she’d see something that she didn’t want to.

“And I don’t know what you’re trying to tell me.”

She didn’t know that, either. She wasn’t trying to tell him anything, she had only been bothered thinking, really over-thinking that night with Erend, whatever had happened between them, if it had meant anything, and the reason why she had been so overwhelmed so suddenly in the middle of it. The image of his shattered hopes when she left the room had been burning in the back of her mind ever since, fighting for attention with the memories of their passionate kissing and his soft lips. His soft lips… His rough hands. The weight of his body above her. Why did she push him off? She sighed at the reverie, rolling eyes at herself. She shouldn’t have, but if she hadn’t, then. Then. Huh. She hadn’t been ready. She hadn’t had time to even consider something like that. She had panicked from not being ready. It all fit together, and now she felt like an idiot. Embarrassed at her own past actions. Well, maybe next time… Would there be a next time? He said there would be. She held him to it.

She turned to Nil and met with his eyes. Surprisingly, they didn’t faze her. “Have you slept with a man before?”

He raised both eyebrows this time, not out of shock, but pure disappointment at her question, as if he had been expecting more. Something actually interesting. “Invasive, but sure.”

“What is it like?”

The lack of enthusiasm on his face changed, being replaced by pure and complete malice, with a smirk to top it off. She didn’t like it at all, was even weary at it, but after his answer, she started to change her mind. “Well, I could show you that. It’d be worth a million words.” Maybe… He could? Maybe he could… It sounded like a joke, the way he said it, but the look on his eyes was very, very truthful, and it didn’t point to him throwing this around lightly. As this seemed to be a recurring thing with men, they flirted tending to joking, but in the end meant all of it. Either that, or sex just wasn’t serious, and she had been expecting something more formal than it needed to be. Maybe she had been wrong about it. Maybe it wasn’t worth stressing over, and she didn’t have to worry herself sick because of it. Everyone had slept with everyone, and she had been kept out of the loop. It hardly seemed fair. When young, asking Rost about it was fruitless, because he always repassed her over to Odd Grata, who didn’t actually speak to her, so inquiring was good for nothing. As the years passed, men became a mystery to her, even if her own body didn’t.

“Yeah, maybe you could.”

Nil kissed differently from Erend, as she probably should have expected. He was thirsty where Erend was sweet. He kissed as if he were trying to pull the soul out of her body, which wasn’t bad, only different. She tried to kiss back in kind, but it was too hungry for her to be successful at it, so she settled at being sweet instead, letting him have the lead. He scooted closer and put a hand on the back of her neck, keeping her close, and since he wasn’t wearing a proper shirt, she took that to her advantage, running a palm up his stomach, to his olive chest. He didn’t mind that at all, only responded by sticking a hand under her shirt as well, which was fair. His hand wasn’t as rough as Erend’s, though, it was actually pretty soft, and she found herself wishing that it wasn’t. She ran her palm up to his shoulders and removed the armor that he wore like an open vest, having him allow it to fall down his arms before taking it off completely, and throwing it aside. She decided that it was fair to do the same, and slipped off the crop-top with the dozen necklaces that reinforced her armor, but left the undershirt on, for now. He leaned forward and locked their lips again, and she missed the sturdy mustache on her skin. She slipped her eyes shut and kissed back, her mind reverting to the night before, sitting on Erend’s bed, kissing him so passionately, so ferverously. She frowned, her heart suddenly missing him.

Nil was lean, slender, his biceps strong, just not big enough, and his stomach firm, but not soft enough, his sides too thin, his torso too small. He was bigger than her, of course, just not as big as she liked him to be. She kissed him and moved to straddle his lap, his hands on her hips and hers on his shoulders. He squeezed her hips and pulled her closer, his fingers already working to undo her belt, which, with two hands, didn’t take him a second. He tossed the skirt aside, so she did the same for the armor that he wore around his waist, a tassel made of machine parts, but left it on the floor underneath him, since he was sitting on it. Surprisingly, he got up, bringing her along with him, her feet soon finding the ground, and her body naturally stepping away from his personal space.

“Let’s go into one of these huts, at least. Unless you want to stay out here?” He lifted a brow at her, but at his great idea, she was already picking up their discarded gear and shoving his onto his chest, pushing him toward the closest hut, regardless of the piles of corpses surrounding them.

“No, you make a compelling point.”

She carried her crop-top and skirt after him, following him inside as he laughed.

The wooden hut had a small, single person cot in a corner, aside from a few furniture pieces that served as storage, and now as wardrobe, as both of them dropped their armor on it, only because it was better than leaving it on the floor. Nil turned to her and resumed their kissing in no time, with one arm around her waist to pull her toward the cot. She grinned into the kiss, something about it just funny to her. What would be a more fitting first time than in a newly overtaken bandit camp, with bodies still warm on the floor, on a wobbly cot, all the while thinking of a man other than the one with the hands on her? Nil pushed her down onto the cot and she fell down laughing, finding all of this to be hilarious. Nil didn’t, but he didn’t say anything about that, either. He was too insane himself to have any credibility to point fingers at her, anyway. He took her knees and removed her boots, then laid above her, just as she started to sober up from the laughter. They kissed, and she kept her eyes open, watching the decorations on his face as he pressed his hips against hers. She had to remind herself that this wasn’t Erend, the body against hers wasn’t Erend’s, and the grinding on her hips wasn’t Erend. She moved a hand to Nil’s side, feeling how thin he was, proof that he wasn’t Erend. She wrapped both legs around Nil’s waist, locking them at the ankles as he ground down on her, at a different angle now, that somehow felt good, so she stayed like that, enjoying his work.

After their pants had been removed, she couldn’t help but compare him to Erend again, which was _bad_ because she had to pay attention to what was happening instead of playing spot the seven differences in her head. She had to focus because she had never done this before, but Nil was so similar to Erend, in shape maybe, even if she couldn’t tell with precision in the darkness of the hut, and she wouldn’t touch him, either, making telling a little complicated. She definitely should stop comparing them, but whatever, Nil kissed her like an animal, and pulled her shirt up to her neck, and all she could think of was Erend. He grabbed her breasts, handling them more gently than his personality would lead her to believe, but still she felt like punching him square on the nose, and seeing him bleed down on her face. She didn’t know why she always got violent urges when it came to things like this, but she managed to control herself this time, and not push him off. Her nails dented his shoulders, for sure, but he didn’t protest that, and it was the only way that she’d keep from hitting him, holding on tight instead.

Sex, she realized, was an ordeal. It took preparation, and even if Nil was good, and made her feel good, it still took a long time. She had fun, of course, but it tired her. The fingering was nice, even if his touch was too soft, and penetration hurt at first, but not for too long, and Nil knew how to touch her, and soon she was feeling good again, under his body. Which could’ve been heavier, but she wasn’t comparing him to Erend anymore. She didn’t even know that name. It was wiped out clean off her mind. She focused on Nil, and how he felt inside her, and his palm on her clit, and he wasn’t rough at all, he was very sweet, their lips in a chaste kiss for the most of it, and the hut filled with both of their moaning, and panting, and the cot’s creaking. It shook so much that she was half-expecting it to break at any moment, and drop both of them to the floor, but, surprisingly, it didn’t. Then she remembered Erend’s huge double bed completely made out of sturdy mahogany, and how even that had shook as he fucked her hand, so it was good that he wasn’t here, or he’d already have broken the cot.

Except she didn’t _know_ that name, she only knew Nil right now, and his lips against hers, and his hips meeting hers, and her own thighs squeezing his waist, moving along with his body, and how warm he was inside of her, pushing a tiny bit deeper each time, but his tempo reminded her of Erend, and his big hips, and his thick body, and how much wider her legs had spread around _his_ waist, and his big cock thrusting into her hand, and how _would_ he feel inside of her?, so warm, so _hot_ , and fast, her nails digging into his back as his hips hit hers like a ton of bricks each time, heavy, hard, sinking her into the mattress, his hot breathing on her neck, maybe he moaned her name?, and she sighed, but it was too loud, and her legs squeezed him harder, and her back arched, and she was so loud that she didn’t know if that was really her voice.

When she opened her eyes, she was absolutely shocked to see Nil lying beside her. Had she forgotten all about him? She got up, still panting rather than breathing, her head in a swirl and her body aching, but the cot wasn’t big enough for the two of them, and she felt like getting dressed anyway. She did so, sitting back down on the edge of the cot, her head getting better, but her stomach not so much. It sunk, something inside of her leaving her chest empty. Nil touched her back softly, making her turn to look at him. She had never seen him worried before.

“Are you alright?” His voice wasn’t a whisper, but it was very close to one. She nodded despite herself, although maybe she was alright, only it didn’t feel like so. She needed rest, that was for sure, and somehow, the thought of sleeping above Nil with his arms around her was a welcoming one.


	3. Into the Borderlands

Dawn broke, and a few hours later, the two of them were up, dressed, and parting ways. Nil briefly told her the general direction of where he would be for the next few days, in case that she needed to talk to him, and she told him that she’d be in Meridian, except she didn’t know for how long. Nil didn’t kiss her goodbye, he only smiled and nodded and touched her shoulder before bidding adieu. Maybe that was for the better, even if she had been expecting something more. She cleared her head off of the thought and whistled for her mount to show.

Of course, in Meridian, the first person that she asked after was Erend, and Blameless Marad was kind enough to take her to him, as well as introduce her to their Sun King Avad. The two were waiting for her by the throne, and her eyes glued to the side of Erend’s head the moment that he came in sight, her heart fluttering in response. The closer she got to the throne, the wider her smile became, until she was standing right across from him, with his eyes on her and not a single word on her tongue. She was speechless, staring dumbly at him, but the King greeted her first, redirecting her attention over to him and his shiny crown instead. Unsure of how to act in the presence of royalty, Aloy only nodded and kept silent, now by choice, while the King asked Erend to tell of his findings concerning the beat-up corpse believed to be his sister. Fortunately, he had found proof that Aloy had been right in her researching, and the body was, in fact, not Ersa.

The relief that left her with a single breath was more freeing than breaking loose from the Embrace.

They soon started discussing Ersa’s possible whereabouts, and for that matter who had kidnapped her, which led to Blameless Marad dropping a name, Dervahl, enemy of hers and, from Erend’s reaction, the entirety of the Claim as well. The man was heard to be lurking near the border, and being one step ahead of everyone, Blameless Marad had already sent an agent to investigate this. The guy was waiting for their word in a small settlement named Pitchcliff, so King Avad decided to send a few Vanguardsmen alongside Aloy to meet him. The way he proposed that sounded strange to her, but she didn’t mention it, and only watched in silence as he commanded the other two men to leave them alone for a moment. Her eyes instantly flicked over to Erend, who was already turning to leave, and stayed on him until he disappeared behind the throne.

The little chat with King Avad wasn’t as bad as her gut had led her to believe. He only wanted for the two of them to get to know each other a little better, and so told some stories about himself, and this Kingdom. He turned out to be a sweet man, who had teamed up with Ersa back in the day to overthrow his father, the last Sun King, off the throne, thus earning him the new title and position. He seemed to care deeply for Ersa, which Aloy couldn’t help but see the hint of a romantic undertone to such affection, but knew better than to ever bring it up. She did, however, critique his grandeur style of living, but not that he could do anything about it but laugh and agree, although he didn’t seem bothered by the castle, the worshipping and all of the fine things in his possession. She knew that, were she in his place, she could never take up a role such as this. If being praised as the Anointed by the Nora was bad enough, then she could never imagine being praised as Queen. It left a bad taste in her mouth just thinking about it.

She bid King Avad farewell after their conversation was done, and left the throne room, her mind already mapping out the route to Pitchcliff when her eyes suddenly fell on Erend, making her stop everything and halt in place. He had been sitting on an ottoman by the wall, surely waiting for her as she spoke with the King, and got up to meet her, an excited smile on his face. He walked over while she only took one step forward, her body slow to react to seeing him again, finally alone with him, after what had felt like forever, even if she had just seen him last afternoon. She was smiling bright, but not that her brain noticed it.

“Hey, will you be traveling with us?” He grinned down at her, his enthusiasm visible and highly contagious, infecting her pretty much at sight. His question almost didn’t register, her head too fuzzy to think straight and her hands too eager to touch, to take his arm, to feel the roughness of his hand. She managed to keep her hands to herself and nod back at him instead.

“Yeah, of course. Traveling alone is no fun.”

“I just thought you had other business to attend to before visiting Pitchcliff, but I’m glad you’re coming with us. It’ll make the journey far less boring.”

His smile filled her stomach with butterflies and she wanted to kiss it, she wanted to grab his face and kiss it, all of it, her hands were shaking for it, so she closed them in fists, her grin far too wide to be normal. He didn’t seem to notice anything amiss, and gladly accompanied her down the various set of stairs back to downtown Meridian, where his men usually were lounging about. They straightened up at his sight, some of them getting drafted on the spot, hand-picked by Erend, and immediately starting to follow him at the command. They got in relative formation before heading to the settlement gates, where Erend stopped them for a briefing. Aloy listened to his voice more in the background of her mind, her eyes too busy trained on his face, on the movement of his arms, to pay much attention to the nitty and gritty of his words. She already was on par with the plan, so missing the exposition didn’t make a difference. The men all seemed to understand their mission, without question about it, although with questions about _her_. They asked if she would be accompanying them, to which she replied positively, and the relief on their faces was so visible that it flattered her.

The Vanguard, she realized, didn’t have a solid formation, only a general sense to stick together and follow behind Erend, and that was all to it. She walked beside him through the richly green scenery and the long stretch of desert, littered with rocky cliffs and a wide variety of plants mixed up in the middle of the sand, although some big patches had grass and trees, almost tricking her into believing that they were walking through a forest. Many detours had to be taken, as the main path forward was the home of some dangerous machines, oftentimes in groups, but when unavoidable, combat always proved successful on their side. Erend’s men were proficient with their heavy duty weapons and were a great help to the two of them during those times, besides offering light chatter and an impressive array of jokes during the downlow that Aloy had never heard before, and got her snorting through her laughter up on the frontline halfway to Pitchcliff. Even as they stopped to set up camp after the sun had gone down, she couldn’t help but overhear some of their conversation and giggle to herself. Their banter wasn’t secret, but she wasn’t trying to listen in, either. It just naturally reached her as she built the campfire.

The ghost stories over dinner were anything but scary, until one of the men told a real story that had happened to him up in the mountains, years back, before he even joined the Vanguard, that scarred him for life. He wasn’t sure of what he had seen, but it was enormous, and it roamed through the skies, angrily zapping down lightning somehow, at the settlements below. He had never forgotten the blurry, foggy vision of that bird, or machine, whatever it was, floating through the sky and dancing behind the clouds. The rest of the Vanguard went eerily silent after his tale, eating the remaining of their dinner before, one by one, starting to retire to bed. They all had their own little tents, usually accommodating two to three people, since sleeping alone in the wild was far too dangerous, but Aloy hadn’t seen anyone creep into Erend’s tent yet, her attention keeping a smart eye on it, so, maybe, she could invite herself in. Worst case scenario, he declined, and she’d pitch her own tent, no hard feelings. Except she really wanted to kiss him, but if that were really the case, the she could wait until tomorrow.

She held back on purpose, lounging by the fire and watching the Vanguard slowly trickle into their respective tents, until Erend made to leave, and her first reaction was to follow. But she didn’t, not before asking, although, in the end, she didn’t have to, because he beat her to the punch, as per usual. Just as she parted her lips, he spoke over her.

“Can I talk to you, Aloy? Over there?” His eyes left her face for the fraction of a second to indicate a general location outside of their little improvised camp, somewhere in the darkness of the treetops shielding off the moonlight, which seemed like an awesome idea. The perfect idea.

“Sure.” She nodded and got up to follow him, not seeing anything shady about this business at all, only the right opportunity to grab him by the neck and yank him down for a kiss. Perfect, just perfect. They got up and walked off, away from the camp, leaving behind a few suspicious Vanguardsmen that whispered among themselves theories that were probably one hundred percent on point about the two of them and the nature of their relationship, but not that Erend minded when he usually would, while Aloy only wished for these rumors to spread enough to get to her.

Erend stopped and turned to look at her, the two of them safely secluded from prying eyes in the darkness of the desert forest, and her perfect opportunity was right there, the opening was within reach, and yet, she chickened out. She couldn’t do it. She just looked at him, and suddenly it hit her that she didn’t actually know what he had wanted with her away from his men in the first place.

“Look, I can’t ask you this in front of the Vanguard, but… Do you want to share the tent? I mean, as friends, with no implications, of course. Just sleeping.”

He talked, and her eyes were on his lips, her mind thinking of nothing but kissing him, only registering the question that he posed her and nothing else, nothing other than the word _friends_ , which, for some reason, started to haunt her. She nodded and stepped closer, way into his personal space by now, when a sort of déjà vu placed itself together and made her step right back, wearing a frown on her forehead. “Erend.” She spoke reflectively, as a thought started to form in the nebulous void that was her mind and pushed her to voice it. “Are you still hung up feeling guilty about that other night?” It was in the way that he felt the need to clarify his platonic intentions now, just as he had done downstairs after she had ran off to calm down. He was being careful around her.

“Yes, well, it was my fault, and I don’t want to scare you off again. I really like you, Aloy. Plus, you’re turning my life around with Ersa, and you’re an amazing fighter. An amazing _person._ I just can’t lose someone like you because of something dumb that I did. I can’t risk it.” His eyes were on her, and their sincerity was so crystal clear, in the shape of his brows, in the line of his lips. Her eyes watched his lips, but the words that left them got lost in the nebula. She ignored everything that he had just said and closed the gap between them with a single step, pulling him down to meet his mouth with hers. Her eyes fluttered closed on their own as her chest filled up with air, so much that it felt like her rib cage would burst right open. He grabbed her face in both hands and kissed her hard, the feeling of his mustache on her skin so incredibly missed, the radiating warmth of his body a pleasant remembrance. She grinned into the kiss, having missed this _so much_ , and making him grin, too. She had noticed this before, how he pretty much mirrored after her, how much she affected him. It brought a warm and welcome feeling to her chest that pushed her to stand on tiptoes and kiss him more, so much more. She wanted her lips to ache from him just like in that other night, and she wanted him above her again, for things to end differently this time. She wanted _him_ , all of him. She wanted what she had so dearly missed.

He didn’t taste of brew this time, which was probably a good sign, however uncharacteristic of him it felt to her. She had only kissed him drunk before, and despite how much she had liked it, kissing his sober self felt more… Ethical. As if, whatever they had between them, was truly valid now. Real. He wrapped an arm around her waist and glued her to him, so impossibly close, exactly what she had wanted from this inconspicuous meeting veiled by shadows in the first place. She bit his bottom lip in a grin and braced both forearms on his wide shoulders, her toes just about brushing the ground at this point. It made her so happy, being this close to him, in the same wavelength as him. The intensity of the feeling was addictive, it almost spun her into a stupor from how thoroughly it intoxicated her brain. She barely knew what to do with it, other than kiss him to exhaustion, which had been her goal for a good while now, anyway. It all fit together.

She grabbed the orange scarf around his neck and tugged on it, their messy kissing slowly becoming less messy. “I need you out of this armor.” She spoke against his lips, half muffled and half whispered, breathless, without really breaking apart. She had to touch him, his stomach, his sides, his biceps. She had been thinking about this all day long, and obediently keeping her hands to herself while in company of his men. It was torture, but she had made it, and now, with his mouth on hers and his hands on her body, she wouldn’t be able to turn back, even if she wanted to. Which she desperately didn’t. Erend put her back down, leaning over accordingly as not to break apart, but once her feet were entirely on the ground, he did so, regardless. She continued holding his scarf with both hands, so he wouldn’t step back too far. He looked at her while wearing a frown, confusing her and making her frown as well.

“No, we can’t do this here. Not with the Vanguard right out there.” His voice was a whisper that turned her frown into a smirk.

“Just be quiet, then.” She closed the gap between them again with a kiss and removed her hands from his clothes, slipping them around his hips instead, where the bottom of his chestpiece ended just above the waistband of his pants, and the belt that he wore over it. She grabbed the hem of his armor, so he took her wrists and broke the kiss.

“No, Aloy, we can’t. I need to set an example.”

“And what’s that?”

“Of a responsible leader.”

At his answer, she backed off. She stepped away from him, but he held her into his personal space by the wrists, and soon, by the hands, so she stayed. She couldn’t well meet with his eyes anymore, they were too apologetic, as if he were to blame, which he really wasn’t. Erend had a point, and a good one at that. She should’ve noticed it beforehand. She let go of his hands and grabbed his face for one chaste kiss before stepping back and ceasing all physical contact.

“You’re right. Let’s just go back and rest for the night, shall we? It’s well-earned by now.” She smiled sweetly up at him, starting the very short walk back to the camp with him in tow, however mournful the look in his eyes were. He ran a hand through the mohawk, completely devastated, and it got her thinking. Maybe he wanted her as much as she wanted him.

There were considerably less soldiers still lounging by the fire than the last time that they were here, so Erend bid them goodnight and followed Aloy into the tent. She didn’t miss the suspicious, sometimes malicious, look on their faces as they replied with their own goodnights before she disappeared into the tent, and took the left side of the double pad for herself. Erend zipped up the entrance and kneeled on the right side, reaching over to light the lantern for the two of them. The huge campfire outside cast an orange glow on the walls of the tent, but not enough light filtered in from it. Aloy removed her crop-top, necklaces and bracers on the meanwhile, leisurely watching him light the lantern and put it back down before moving to undo his belt. Her eyes immediately dropped down to his hands as he removed the tasset and put it aside, going for the chestpiece next. She watched him take it off overhead, her attention on the sliver of skin where his shirt rode up from his raised arms. She bit her lip, her hands closing in fists at her sides. Sharing a tent didn’t feel like a good idea anymore. She forced her eyes away from him and tried to focus on herself instead, kicking off her boots and removing her own skirt, but every time he moved beside her, it caught her attention, and she had to remind herself not to stare.

Ready for bed, she laid down and pulled the covers up to her neck, the weather surely chilly out in the desert after sunset, especially having a thin tent as sole protection. Erend followed her close behind, slipping under the covers before reaching to put out the lantern, and drowning the space around them in darkness once again, only broken by the dim glow of the outside fire. He shifted beside her for relative comfort, rustling the covers on his side, and soon arriving at the conclusion that nothing would change how thin the mat below them was. Aloy hid a grin behind the covers, the restlessness inside of her finally, _finally_ halting to an end, and allowing her blood to run chiller in Erend’s presence. Maybe she could actually make it through the night without wanting to pull him above her.

By morning, the camp was dismantled and the Vanguard marched onwards to Pitchcliff, the scenery around them changing drastically from the desert to a snowy foothill the closer they got to it. Pitchcliff was a very small settlement hanging from the side of a mountain somewhat related to Daytower, impossible to be mistaken for anything else because of its rudimentary rock path up to the gates, just beside a narrow river crossed by a small wooden bridge. The Vanguard took immediate interest in the campfire next to the bridge, the lot of them not very content with the cold, so Erend told them to wait there, since meeting with Blameless Marad’s agent shouldn’t take long. He did, however, ready action with them should anything suspicious pass, either an obvious ambush from the Eclipse or if he and Aloy took too long for what should only be a brief conversation with the guy, to which case the Vanguard was to charge in. Otherwise, they could stay there and enjoy the warmth of the fire.

The deal was to meet the man at the marketplace, but at first glance, he was nowhere to be found, and given the incredibly small size of the settlement, chances of the two of them somehow overlooking his location was little to none. It felt suspicious, not only to Aloy, but she could see the same feeling on Erend’s face, which prompted her to investigate. Through her Focus, it was easy to find a trail of someone in despair, desperately trying to scurry away from danger, so she followed it up the small town to a secluded area surrounded by archaic machinations and a water wheel, where a corpse laid in broad daylight, hidden enough as not to be found. It could only have been Blameless Marad’s informant, who got chased down and killed for his discoveries, heroically managing to draw a map before imminent death. It was gory, his own blood in the shape of an arrow, but it got the message across, that perhaps it pointed to Dervahl’s location. Erend and Aloy decided not to alert the town of this murder, lest they got dragged into anything, and left Pitchcliff at once for their newly found destination.

Further up the snowy path where they had come from was a big camp, looking a lot like those of bandits, except this one had machines chained up and soldiers poking at them. Erend explained that Dervahl was a tinkerer, and if this was really his camp, then those machines were being used for either experimentation or spare parts. Aloy was fairly sure that this was the correct location where Ersa was being kept captive, and told the Vanguard to lay low while approaching, holding off for just a moment while she stirred up trouble, and once fight broke, they were to attack as well. Erend and his men nodded their consent back at her, sending her on her way. The plan was to snipe down some of the archers up in the watchtowers, then sneak over to the machines and override them, not only for their support, but mainly for the commotion, a good distraction that would allow her to climb up the rafters on the right side and hide in the upper part of the building, the perfect spot for a sniper. She managed to put most of that in action, getting up to high ground as Dervahl’s soldiers and the Vanguard charged at each other with machines in the mix. Her location allowed her to shoot down both man and machine, and not too long passed before most of their enemies were down, and a surprise emerged from the cottage behind her.

A heavily armored man wielding a massive gun joined the fight, and aimed the first shot at her. Aloy hid behind the small building between the two of them, and crouched, her best bet at taking him on being from the unseen. She moved over to the tall grass next to where she had climbed up here from, and sniped at him, causing him to redirect the shots over to this side now, which wasn’t a problem. She dashed back behind the building, using it as a shield, and readied two arrows on her bow for the next shot. She could hear his ridiculously heavy steps approaching from the side of her last location, and tiptoed in the opposite direction, as to try a shot at the back of his head. Just as she was almost done circling the building, the man fired, but not at her. He couldn’t see her from here, so it must’ve been at the Vanguard. That gave her an early opening for the headshot, which she took, but the man still managed to keep standing. Impressive, to say the least. He turned back around and fired, but she was quicker to duck and hide again. She could hear a painful groan, and a smack, and so on, the sparing of combat, so she took the Vanguard’s distraction to her advantage and sniped at the man when he wasn’t looking, playing unfair peek-a-boo until he laid dead on the ground.

As inquiring as ever, Aloy approached his corpse for loot and any new findings. He wore a pair of strange earpieces that she had never seen before, so she took them, and put them on. There was a horrible sound coming from the cottage where the guy had appeared from, which meant that he protected himself from it by wearing these. Erend and the Vanguard watched her curiously as she got up and went over to the front door to investigate. Battle was officially over, but Erend still told his men to keep watch, and stay alert, as a precautionary measure, while the two of them demystified this house. Aloy could see the sonic devices responsible for the noise from the doorway, and didn’t hesitate to walk up to them for destruction, allowing Erend to follow her deeper inside the cottage.

Down the stairway was some sort of small dungeon where a big machine was, creating waves of an awfully loud sound, pointed at a tied up woman lying on the ground. Aloy didn’t have to identify her by the Oseram uniform because Erend shouted his sister’s name at a single glance, then proceeded to dismantle the sonic machine to pieces, with as much anger as was justifiable. He completely destroyed it, then moved to approach his sister, who was, miraculously, alive. Erend kneeled down by Ersa and took her in his arms. She clearly was a strong woman, hanging on by a thread and yet well enough to speak despite it. She mentioned the ambush by Red Ridge Pass, but more importantly, warned them of Dervahl’s plans to attack Meridian soon, very soon. Aloy stood closeby to listen in, both impressed by Ersa’s strength, and saddened at her physical state, visibly unable to hold on for much longer. She warned them about the attack, touched Erend’s cheek and said a few encouraging words to him before passing in his arms.

Erend was devastated, and then immediately vengeful. Dervahl would pay, but first they had to find him, and Meridian was a big town. They’d need clues indicating his whereabouts to be successful in the chase, otherwise it would all have been for nothing. Erend expressed this thought with boiling blood in his veins, and then, as fast as it had boiled, it cooled down, and his eyes dropped again, at the body in his arms, as he fell silent. He obviously needed a moment with her, so Aloy expressed her sentiments and stepped back, turning to investigate the room. What had seemed like a dungeon at first glance looked more like an office now, with items of Dervahl’s scattered about here and there. She found an audiolog mentioning his family, and a journal mentioning a big heap of blaze, surely to be used without good intentions. She picked up the journal and perused it for a while longer, leisurely reading from the pages in order to give Erend a moment longer to mourn, until the journal ran blank and Aloy decided it was time to tell him of her findings, at last. She closed the journal and approached him carefully, having her heart shatter when he looked up at her, his eyes woefully sad. That made her change her mind, and keep this information for later, when he wouldn’t be this emotionally unavailable. Instead, she smiled softly, and said that she’d be waiting for him outside with the Vanguard. He only nodded, looking back down right after.

Outside, the soldiers were dying to know what had happened, and showered her in questions the moment they saw her. Fortunately, they weren’t loud about it, their voices in hushed whispers, in case that it should ever reach Erend. Aloy explained of Ersa’s death, and how devastated Erend was over it, but didn’t have to go into extensive detail, because at that, the entire Vanguard fell silent, apparently having heard enough. They looked at each other, then removed their helmets to pay respects. A sad smile came to her at the sight. Ersa had been dearly loved by all of these people, her brother and the King, and would be terribly missed. Erend would have to fill in for her as Captain, however difficult it might be for him and the soldiers, and maybe the cutthroat encouragement of bringing Dervahl down would be a first step toward that.

Erend emerged from the cottage a few minutes later, carrying Ersa in both arms, and ordered the Vanguard to make some sort of cot for her with whatever they could find. The men were entranced by the sight of their dead leader, so beat-up and yet undeniably her, but soon shook out of it and began to scurry about gathering wood-ridge and machine parts. Aloy remained by Erend, her shy nature suddenly taking over and stopping her from saying a word to him. In fact, it erased every word of the English vocabulary from her brain, rendering speech useless, so she stood around beside him, and tried not to stare, but ultimately failed. His eyes were puffy and red and _still_ glossy, as if a tear could drop at any moment, and her heart broke again. He held Ersa close to his chest, as much as he could while carrying her, and by the trembling of his arms, she could see that they were about to give, although Erend wasn’t. However heavy his sister might have been, he didn’t let go of her until the makeshift cot was done, with two soldiers to carry it, one on each end. He put her down carefully, making sure that the two men were aware of it enough as not to let the cot drop, and draped a blanket over her before announcing the start of their return.

The amount of detours taken this time were doubled, since they were in a lesser number now and had two men pretty much defenseless with their hands busy, although it didn’t completely erase battle from the journey. Machines still spotted and attacked them, only the Vanguard was wise enough to take a path that didn’t lead through sites of very big or dangerous creatures, so chances of success were virtually always guaranteed. Aloy worried for Erend during battle this time around, something she had never done before, since he was an excellent fighter, but on the way back he seemed to be so emotionally shattered that she worried it would affect his fighting negatively. During the first combat that they came across, she stuck to his side, but soon realized that he didn’t need protecting. If anything, his broken heart only served to make him stronger, and angrier, causing him to dismantle machines with more violence and ease than ever before. It was almost frightening, and pushed Aloy to stick to her own side instead, only darting an eye at him every now and then.

After sundown, they stopped in a relatively small settlement to spend the night and rest. Erend went ahead and booked two rooms at an inn, one for himself and one to keep Ersa’s body safe, dismissing the rest of the Vanguard to do as they liked for the evening. Aloy sincerely thought of getting a separate room for herself, feeling that Erend would probably like some privacy to mourn on his own, but she was wrong. He debunked that thought before she even reached the front desk. He pulled her back by the arm and gave her the key, without any explanation, only saying that it was to his room. She raised a brow at it, then looked up to meet with his eyes. They weren’t glassy anymore, only tired now, and she couldn’t decide which was worse.

“I’m going to the tavern. Will you be around when I come back?” He sounded absolutely exhausted, and for as much as she wanted to invite him up to his room for a full night’s rest, she knew that it wasn’t her place to, and instead nodded her consent to his slow self-degradation.

“Yeah, I’ll be upstairs. I’ll open the door for you.” She offered him a polite smile that he responded to with a curt nod.

“Alright, I’ll be back later.”

Every part of her was screaming to seize him by the arm before he left, but she let him go, watching immobile until he disappeared behind the front door. It just wasn’t her place, it had nothing to do with her. He mourned with a high percentage of alcohol in his bloodstream, so what? People did that all the time. It was his business, not hers, and she had no right to intervene in the life of a man that she barely knew. Of course she cared for him, simply adored him, but they were only friends, and nothing more. He wasn’t her husband, or the story would be entirely different. He was nothing of hers, and could do as he pleased, just as she did the exact same.

On the first floor was a sort of bar with a few tables and live music from a performer or two that probably happened to also be staying at this inn, so Aloy took a seat and enjoyed some tunes, enough so that the nebulous thoughts in her head began to dissipate and only the idea of a good night’s sleep replaced them. She had a cup of water or two, watched some people dance to the music, and when her eyelids started to droop, she went upstairs to rest. Or, at least, that was her intention, but once she was actually in bed, and comfortably snuggled in as well, falling asleep seemed a far-fetched idea. She tossed and turned more than anything, her brain kicking it up an unnecessary notch to worry after Erend, and worry after Meridian, which, for all that she knew, could be going up in flames at this very moment, while she enjoyed the comfort of a nice hotel room that wasn’t even hers. She sighed, tired of overthinking and losing sleep over irrationality, but to her luck, she wouldn’t have to continue alone with her thoughts for much longer. A heavy knock on the door, which sounded more like a bang, made her jump right out of her skin, and erase everything that had been in her brain a second before. Something so careless couldn’t be the work of anyone other than Erend’s drunk ass.

“Aloy, open up. It’s me.” As if he really needed to confirm her suspicions, he did so far too loudly for this late in the night, and yet without receiving any annoyed complaints from the neighboring rooms as consequence, which was surprising. Maybe they were intimidated by his gruff, slurry voice. She rolled her eyes but got up from the bed and went unlock the door for him anyway, as had been promised.

He was leaning on the door frame with an arm, still towering over her despite the slight slouch, and his eyes cast down on her burned. Not out of anger, but something else. He leaned away from the frame and ducked down for a kiss, taking her face in both hands as he went. It was heavy, his weight pushing her back, and his lips hard on hers. This reaction from him was so unexpected that it sent her reeling, but kissing back regardless. She grabbed the side of his neck with a hand and swung the door ceremoniously closed with the other.

The space between the door and the bed was small, and yet he managed to stumble his way over, his body swaying from side to side with each step and bringing her along for the dance. It would’ve been funny if it didn’t preoccupy her instead. She broke the kiss when her thighs found the edge of the mattress. “Erend, how much did you have?” With a hand on his jaw, she pushed him back enough to look into his half-lidded eyes, dim and hazy even under the bright moonlight. His face was red, this time undoubtedly from the brew.

“Me? Everything.” He was slurring so bad that she almost couldn’t make out his answer, which probably meant that kissing him wasn’t a good idea, but he angled her face up and their mouths met again and he knew exactly what he was doing, despite it being unavoidably messily, and she just yielded. There was no way around it, she could never turn him down, not when their tongues met and his body pressed up against hers.

“Everything? What kind of answer is that?” She broke the kiss and laughed, actually having fun despite herself while climbing backwards onto the bed. Erend took his gloves off easily but had trouble slipping the chestpiece overhead, which only made her laugh more, and not help, because he’d make it soon enough. Throwing the armor on the floor, he shrugged, and kneeled onto the mattress.

“I don’t know.”

He looked annoyed for a brief moment, his voice gruff and grumpy as his hands worked to remove the tassel from around his hips. Aloy leaned forward to be of assistance this time. She locked their lips together and didn’t have to slap his hands away, because they instantly found her face, holding her close for one of the hard-hitting kisses that left her head spinning. Erend loomed forward, heavier than last time, and with both hands busy tossing his tassel aside, she had no support to keep herself sitting on the bed from this. They invariably crashed down, with him above her, nearly knocking the wind out of her with his weight, but their mouths still firmly stuck together, and their tongues inseparable. He shifted around, his hips digging into hers from this angle, and the warmth of his body making her hyperventilate. She wrapped both arms around his waist, delighted at how wide it was, and thoroughly enjoyed their closeness.

She had missed this so bad. His weight above her, his lips on hers, their kissing messy and harsh and absolutely _perfect_ , his hands on her face and on her neck and on her body, burning her skin with his fingertips, scorching her body with his own. He tugged and kissed and bit until her lips were aching and she was completely breathless. Only then did he move his mouth to her jaw instead, kissing down to her neck. She had never seen him so hungry, and couldn’t help but relate to the feeling. Her hands had been digging nails into his back, underneath his shirt, so she ran them up to his shoulders and brought the shirt along, to slip it off him. Or, she meant to, but he didn’t move from her neck, too busy biting her skin to care, so she left that be for the moment, and enjoyed his tongue on her flesh instead. His hands pulled her shirt up some and slipped right under, in a bee line to her breasts, which, for once in her life, didn’t make her want to jab him upward the jaw. His palms were rough and he squeezed hard, making her cover her mouth with a hand to keep quiet from the surprise. He was just as harsh as she thought he’d be, manhandling like a brute while grinding their hips together, and making her want to move along with him, having one leg swung over his waist already. He huffed in the crook of her neck, sending shivers down her spine, and brought a hand down to her pants.

She couldn’t be more glad to kick them off, and have enough room to follow that up with the removal of her shirt. Erend pushed himself up to his knees to get undressed, too, throwing his shirt aside and yanking his pants halfway down to his thighs. Her eyes only got a quick glance at his cock before he was diving back above her, showering her neck with open-mouthed kisses as his hands grabbed her thighs and pulled them up. Everything he did was with so much unnecessary force that she wondered if he noticed this. Given his state, probably not. She locked both legs around his waist by the ankles and braced both arms across his shoulder blades, both giddily excited and a little scared. Or maybe more than just a little scared.

“Erend.” Her voice was stern, in the shape of a whisper loud enough to get his attention, however scattered it was in his foggy brain. He hummed his acknowledgement on the skin of her neck, his hips lowering to get in position, and the feeling of his cock brushing past her clit could drive her crazy. But she focused. “Erend, be nice.” She hated how breathless she sounded already, her heartbeat off the rails without him doing anything yet. He sweetly hummed his understanding and went on to press the tip of his cock on her flesh, pushing in right after, the crown first, quickly followed by half his size in one go. Her breathing halted in surprise as her nails dented his shoulders. He was noticeably larger than Nil, that was for sure, even if not by too much, but enough to make her legs tremble. She gripped his shoulders tight when he started to move, his hips thrusting in a slow pace that soon got her eyes closing and her head rolling back. She felt his teeth sinking into her collarbone and his voice muffled against it as his hands pinned her down beneath himself, grabbing her skin hard enough to mark it, as if his weight alone wasn’t enough to anchor her down.

Erend was heavy, and drunk, and each thrust nailed her further into the bed. Her mind went completely blank with it, and she lost notion of space and time underneath him, all that she knew being replaced by the hot feeling of him inside of her. It stung, pleasantly so, but more than anything, it sent electric waves up her spine that made her arch off the mattress every now and then, or try to, always too squished down to meet with anything but his body. His stomach on hers, their chests breathing together, and their thighs rhythmically meeting, however much he kept missing his tempo. When he angled up, her nails stopped scarring him and a loud moan left her chest. It was perfect, just perfect; it made her thighs twitch while she saw stars. He moved away from her neck, and some of his weight lifted off her body, but she didn’t care to look at what he was doing now, too busy enjoying his ongoing work as it was. She felt his lips on her jaw, in a chaste kiss as his hands hurt her sides and his hips fucked her harder. Erend might as well not even have registered what she had told him, because if this was him playing nice, then she wasn’t sure what the opposite could even be.

They breathed and panted so loudly that it almost drowned out the sound of the headboard hitting the wall. The deeper he reached, the more she went back to sinking nails in his skin, her throat coarse at this point, and her body about to give. She could barely breathe, the wind refusing to get back to her the more their hips met, the harder their hips met, and with each thrust her trembling thighs squeezed him tighter, wanting to close. She knew exactly what this meant, and wasn’t sure whether or not to warn him about it. Impulsively, she didn’t, and only reached down between them instead, having to push him off of herself a little to get to her clit. Erend noticed that through his drunken haze and sped his hips up to attempt a sort of harmony with her frantic rubbing. It ended up being perfect, just the extra push that she needed to cum, moaning through it, and pulsing tight around him. He didn’t last a minute after that, and didn’t pull out either. It surprised her, because Nil had, and this was something that she had never felt before. It was almost alien, but not bad. What _was_ bad was Erend laying all of his weight above her afterwards, and flattening her beneath him. She tried pushing him off, but her arms trembled, and her legs had turned into jelly, so she settled for a firm slap on the ass instead. That jolted him back to his senses on the spot.

“Pull out, and roll _off_.”

He did so, mumbling something incomprehensible that got lost to the void, because she didn’t care to ask for encore. He laid on his back, and she scooted close to him, resting her head on his shoulder and an arm across his stomach. He draped a heavy arm around her as she sighed, perfectly content with the butterflies in her stomach and the fluttering in her heart. She thought that, maybe, she’d want to see this through. Maybe being with him was the right choice, even if he was a drunk bastard. Of course those thoughts were only biased in his favor because he fucked like a God, but whatever. She didn’t care. She was happy, and wonderfully tired, and snuggling up to his side.

“Aloy?” He sounded _just_ as tired, so she didn’t look up at him, only hummed for him to continue. Her mind was already starting to fall asleep. “I love you.” And just like that, she was awake again.


	4. The Sun Shall Fall

When morning came, he didn’t remember a single thing. His wide blue eyes stared in horror at the two of them naked in bed, and she almost wanted to laugh. He brushed back some of her hair from her neck to see the mess that he had made, and was justifiably terrorized. She hadn’t seen it yet, but she could bet her life on how bad it looked. She grinned, and kissed him full on the mouth before hopping out of bed. They still had a long way to go, Meridian surely nothing but a pile of ash by now, so wasting time getting ready wasn’t an option. She went around the room picking her clothes from the floor, and already doing the same for him, since his headache was probably bad enough to kill a person.

“Fuck, I can’t believe this. I am so sorry.” He sounded sincere, even though she didn’t really understand the reason for an apology. Slipping a shirt on, she turned to look at him.

“What for? You were amazing last night.” She shrugged loosely and stepped into her pants, circling the bed for her boots next. Erend was dumbfounded.

“What, really? No, look, it doesn’t matter. I was drunk and I shouldn’t have--”

She cut him off. She didn’t care to hear the rest, he needed to learn when to stop stressing over this, and start stressing over what actually needed stressing over. “Do you remember what you told me before falling asleep?” She lifted her brows at him, toeing her boots on while he still sat naked in bed. A sight to see, always a look, but this wasn’t the time. They were running late for sure.

“No, I just hope it wasn’t embarrassing.” He finally got up and made to start getting dressed, so she threw his things to him and moved on to her skirt. He barely caught anything.

“Yeah, it was a little. A little embarrassing, yeah.” She nodded to herself while speaking, the skirt being fastened securely on her hips before she reached for the crop-top and necklaces. Erend noticed her strange emotional state, but decided against inquiring after it.

Dressed up and ready, the two of them, accompanied by Ersa, met the Vanguard outside and began the long stretch back to Meridian, still on the long way around to avoid unnecessary conflict with the machines. Aloy, however, found them to be marching too slow to save the settlement, and excused herself to Erend, plus his men, to get a mount and ride ahead, on the premise that arriving early could earn her some time to deal with Dervahl’s attack, if needed. Erend gave her an odd look, but agreed to it nonetheless, knowing that she’d go ahead regardless. If anything, pretending that they were on the same page about it looked more professional in front of the Vanguard. She called over the closest mount available and bid them all goodbye for now.

She rode the Charger at full speed back to the settlement, her attention completely focused on the path before her and not at all on Erend’s words last night. The last thing that she wanted was to have a crisis over it, especially at a time like this, with an entire town in danger. A lot of people lived there, some of which that she even knew. Olin was probably back there with his family, right? Was he? She couldn’t honestly recall him saying a single thing about his residence in Meridian, so maybe he was safe back at the state. That _really_ wasn’t the issue here, though. Not now. But she’d rather be speculating Olin’s life than Erend’s love or whatever. Shit, did he really love her? She shook her head, trying to clear it of these thoughts, but how could Erend love her after only knowing her for a handful of days? He couldn’t have been serious. He was hammered, he was as drunk as she had never seen him, he was so drunk that he didn’t even remember saying anything, so, yeah, maybe he didn’t mean that. Maybe she was stressing over nothing, as per fucking usual. Great. That _was_ great, actually. That was very relieving, but at the same time… It made her heart sink. So he didn’t love her? Which case scenario did she even _want_ to be true? This was bad, it was giving her a headache. She needed to reach Meridian soon.

When the gates appeared in the distance, she sighed. So nothing had gone down in flames yet, that was good. She was early. Riding ahead had been a good idea. She dismounted the Charger and entered the town, going straight to where she had met King Avad last time. Except, he wasn’t at his throne at the moment, he was in one of the small resting areas of the palace, speaking with Blameless Marad. As she carefully approached them, she wondered what it was that he hadn’t done that had earned him so blameless.

“Ah, Aloy! How joyful to see you. Where’s the Vanguard? What of Ersa?” The King’s eyes shone at the last question, his expectation to hear good news almost getting the best of him. It was kind of sad, really, that she bore depressing news instead.

“Avad, Marad, the Vanguard is on the way. I only galloped ahead for fear of the settlement’s safety. We reached Dervahl’s camp, and found Ersa, alive, however… I’m sorry to say, she passed soon after. She warned us of Dervahl’s plans to attack Meridian, and I found writings of a massive blaze concentration shipped over here, which, I’m hoping, can lead us to him.”

The toll that Ersa’s death took on King Avad was obviously devastating. He looked distraught, almost missing out on Aloy’s words completely, his mind stuck on the thought of his dear friend’s passing, reeling from the shock of reality. Blameless Marad, however, recovered much quickly, and set on to discuss this whole Dervahl business with her at once.

“The shipment, yes, I suppose it isn’t in his name?”

“No, it’s addressed to an Aelund Forgeman. Does that mean anything to you?”

Blameless Marad had to think for a moment, but his memory didn’t fail him. This name was familiar to him, and had been used to buy a building in the city, near the mesa, that used to be a shop in the past, but could well have been used as a storage instead. If that name was truly Dervahl’s alias, then he might be in said building as they spoke. Aloy got a rush of adrenaline in her veins as Marad mentioned this, and thanked him, already eager to go investigate the location. King Avad, however, asked her for a minute of her time just before she left, and ordered Marad to give them some privacy. Aloy didn’t enjoy that very much, but indulged him, anyway. He was the King, after all.

“Aloy… Were you there, when she…?” He couldn’t even get the word past his lips, too affected by it to speak it. He looked so broken that Aloy felt bad for him.

“Yes, I was, and so was Erend. She… Passed right in his arms. But she was strong, Avad, and knew that she’d be leaving the protection of the city in capable hands.” Aloy offered him a sweet smile, and he nodded in response, falling silent. He sighed, grief surely settling in over his shoulders.

“Yes, she was right, as always… Thank you, Aloy. Are you going to Dervahl’s address right now? Please be careful, I can’t… I can’t lose another great woman to this man. He is strong, so, please, watch out.”

She would. She nodded and reassured him of that before excusing herself to leave. She wasn’t about to break into Dervahl’s storage unit, she would only sneak around the perimeter and peek into the windows, maybe eavesdrop on his conversations, maybe find out more of his plans. Either way, she wouldn’t be obviously visible to him, or any thug guarding the place. She only wanted information, which proved to be very easy to get once she actually approached the building. It was eerily silent, but still she crouched under the windowsills and peeked over them every other minute, mapping out the insides. It wasn’t terribly big, and she could already see an enormous shipment of blaze stacked by the corner of the second floor. It was _worrying_ , to say the least. Any small spark would blow the whole thing up. She had to get this out of here somehow, but alone it could never be. The shipment looked too heavy to be moved by a single person, but perhaps three or four would do. She could really use the Vanguard right about now, but they still had a ways to go before arriving. Perhaps if she recruited them herself? Erend hadn’t taken all of his men, he had left some behind, so maybe she could invite them over for a fun group activity.

At the spot right in front of the bridge leading to the palace, the benched Vanguard and some Carja guards on break sat about chatting, passing time, while leisurely lounging on the stools and at the tables that peppered that area. Aloy approached them casually, expecting a commotion, but none of them seemed to mind her presence, which made her job fairly easier. She sidled up to one of them, catching his eye behind the long helmet that covered his face, and smiled.

“Hey, are you and your friends free by any chance? I have a favor to ask, if any of you would like to listen.” She watched him look at her, in complete silence, then glance about him, as if unsure whether or not she had just referred to him. She rolled her eyes.

“Me? Yeah, of course. I’m just waiting for the Captain’s orders, or the King’s, but… I’ll listen to you, too. Who wouldn’t?” The guy shrugged in a way that pointed to his question being obvious, then called his friends over to gather round and listen to Aloy’s proposition. The men obeyed him, more intrigued in what she needed them to do than in her lack of authority over them, which was simply perfect.

She explained about the blaze, and how it had to be carefully removed from Dervahl’s estate and placed in a safe location for destruction. She spoke while walking to the house, and having the Vanguard follow her close behind, making her feel as powerful as a shepherd. One of the men asked her if the door needed breaking down, and she honestly couldn’t answer, but before she could confirm whether or not that was true, he had already kicked it open. She wondered if that was some sort of Oseram thing. Regardless, she went in, followed by the Vanguard, who already started the removal of the containers upstairs to outside. On the bottom floor, something important that she had missed while scouting turned out to be a group of bombs set up with the right wiring and everything, ready to go off at any moment. The sight of it made her heart stop. Should she try to defuse it while having no knowledge of how to? No, she was smarter than that. She turned around, looking at the organized line of men going up and coming down the stairs, and raised her voice.

“Can any of you defuse a bomb?”

At that, they all looked at her, although not seizing activity. None of them promptly interjected, and soon they were all mumbling that they didn’t know how to, either. It was a shame, but at least she had asked. On second thought, the bomb wasn’t incredibly big, and without the blaze for a devastating explosion, it shouldn’t be of much concern. Maybe they could just leave it there instead.

Outside, the Vanguard was carrying the blaze in twos to a remote location, where the explosion wouldn’t damage the city. It was down a series of stairways and far into the forest, so Aloy accompanied them, hoping that they wouldn’t drop it. They didn’t, of course, but her concern remained, until they were far enough from the borders to set all of the barrels safely down. She thanked them for the help, and proceeded to run back a safe distance, with all of them in tow, as not to miss the fireworks. Back in Meridian and up the various flights of stairs, she readied a fire arrow, and once the whole Vanguard had a good, safe view, she shot it. The blaze exploded incredibly loudly, but didn’t reach the city, which was all that mattered. The Vanguard cheered, and Aloy suddenly understood why Erend hung out with these men. They were _fun_. She thanked them, and dismissed them, her next concern now being Dervahl’s whereabouts, which she could handle by herself. On the floor was an obvious track of blaze left behind, that her Focus picked up, and was obviously not left by the Vanguard. It was her best bet at finding him.

The track led her to a beautiful residence, and down the stairs to a sort of basement, where the side wall had been dug out into a hole to the outside. This was worrying, it gave access to the palace from here, where Dervahl was surely headed, to “make Avad watch the sky darken,” or whatever along those lines. She hoped that Avad was hidden somewhere safe, and to make sure, she should warn him, but before she could, Dervahl himself appeared on the bridge not too far from where she stood. She managed to hide from him just in time, but this meant that leaving now to go the long way round to the palace was certain defeat. If she wanted to stop Dervahl, she’d need to run after him, so she climbed the wall next to her over to the bridge and followed the path that he had just taken.

The bridge led to some sort of water circulation system at the bottom of the palace, where a big waterfall fed it, gathering at the end of a stairway. Two of Dervahl’s men were left behind to guard the entrance, and posed no trouble for Aloy, who handled them fairly easily, and quick enough to continue the path after Dervahl without too much delay. As the two men lay dead at her feet, she rushed up the stairs and down the hallway, coming up to the side of the palace, where an awfully familiar sound reached her. She climbed up the bit of stairs leading to Avad’s resting area, but remained quiet, as to have the upperhand in eavesdropping the situation. Dervahl used the sonic device to torture Avad, and spoke of terrible things before pressing the button to detonate the bomb. Which it did, but without the blaze, as Aloy had suspected, it was no threat at all. The lack of a colossal explosion greatly angered Dervahl, causing him to run off to the next room in anger. Aloy took this opportunity to destroy the device, quickly check on Avad, and then rush after the man who had started all of it.

Facing off with Dervahl would be preferable, but he called in a hoard of men to his aid, hiding behind them, and after they lay dead, he called in a flock of Glinthawks, and after _those_ lay dead, he called in _another_ flock. Aloy shoot arrow after arrow and dodged dangerous drops of ice and blizzard, besides their melee kicking, without stopping or resting, until her vision started to blur, and her head started to spin. The last Glinthawk dropped dead from above, and she needed to lean on a wall for support, her body aching from every joint, and her breathing shallow. From where she stood, she could see Dervahl laying on the ground in pain, clutching to his wounds, but he wouldn’t stay there for much longer. Knowing him, he’d try to run off at the first opportunity, so Aloy pushed herself off the wall and stumbled over to him. Even while in pain, he still harbored enough hatred to put himself above her, and Sun King Avad, and all of Meridian, thinking of himself far too highly than he really deserved, or actually stood. Aloy placed a foot on his chest, to keep him in place, and he looked so fucking pissed that she didn’t know how he didn’t straight up spit in her face.

“Did Erend send you to do his killing?” He sounded weak, coughing through his words as she put more pressure on her foot. She scowled.

“No. I’m here to protect Meridian, and at the King’s orders, capture you. Alive.” While she spoke, Avad’s guards approached alongside him, and proceeded to take hold of Dervahl. She removed her foot from him, and watched as they dragged him down the stairway to the city.

“Aloy, a moment of your time?” King Avad touched her shoulder, so she turned to look at him, smiling weakly despite herself. He looked worried, but at the same time thankful, and for as much rest as she needed, and for as worn out as she was, sitting around for a while chatting with him actually seemed like a wonderful idea. She could tend to her wounds and rest in his company until she was well enough to stand again.

“Of course, Avad. Can I have a seat?” She motioned briefly to the wide variety of settees and ottomans and cushions that decorated the adjacent room, and was glad to see him agree to her idea, and accompany her over. She took a seat on the comfiest settee around, sighing in relief that she didn’t have to continue on her feet for a second longer. Her body ached everywhere, and even breathing hurt. Avad sat on the closest ottoman to her, and began the long speech about how thankful he was to have her save, not only him, but all of Meridian. She smiled a bit, taking out some medicinal herbs that she had on herself to place them on her wounds while he flattered her to no end. Her ego was greatly boosted, but she wasn’t sure that she liked it.

Eventually, Avad mentioned something about her staying in Meridian that made her look at him with a raised brow. “What do you mean, stay in Meridian? Why would I stay?”

“Isn’t it obvious? I can use someone like you at my side. You’re strong, shrewd and capable. You saved an entire city by yourself. Aloy, if you stay, Meridian will be a safer place, and, besides, you can have anything you want. You can have a place in the palace, you can be part of Meridian’s royal defenses, you can have a title, power and respect. I’d feel a lot better with you here. I’m sure all of Meridian would.”

She raised a second brow at him, then looked back down at her wounds. None of what he offered was what she had been looking for, none of what he offered was what she wanted for herself. In fact, it was very close to being the opposite of that. She wanted freedom, she wanted to find herself, her roots, the woman who had made her. She had her own path to take right now, and it didn’t involve being tied to a city. “Avad, I… I’m very grateful for this opportunity, but I have to decline. I’m on a journey at the moment, a journey that can take a long time, and staying here isn’t even an option. I will be back and visit, of course, but I can’t stay. At least… Not right now. I’m sorry.”

He looked disappointed, but nodded in understanding. She was glad that he wasn’t the kind to push it, or she knew that their little conversation would end up giving her a headache, which was something that she really didn’t want at the moment, especially not coupled with the body ache.

“Ah, I understand, I understand. I only hope that you change your mind in the future. Hopefully… The near future. But on the meanwhile, know that Meridian will always be open and welcoming to you, forever in your debt.” Avad was obviously sad about her refusal, but didn’t stay like such for long. As they continued to rest and idly chatter, his cheerful spirits gradually returned to him, and proportioned a very nice time in the palace. They sat around and watched the sunset together, talking of each other, and Ersa, and his curious relationship with her. Aloy tried not to pry, but this would be the perfect opportunity to, if only Avad didn’t shut her down every time she inched close to the subject. He was terribly protective of it, which further led her to believe in their secret romantic relationship. Maybe she wouldn’t get a confirmation out of him right now, but one day.

Not long after sunset, Erend and the Vanguard arrived. They noticed the destruction of battle pretty much all over the palace, and the wardens taking care of it, while Aloy and the King talked it out on the couch. The two men carrying Ersa were ushered by the wardens to the morgue, so Erend dismissed the others and approached the two chitter-chatters with a scowl on his face. He was very clearly mad, and Aloy knew it’d be wise not to antagonize him head on right now.

“Did we miss the attack?” He glanced from the King to the huntress and back, perplexity visible on his voice. Fortunately, Avad took the initiative to answer him, so Aloy didn’t have to.

“Yes, you did, but thankfully, Aloy arrived just in time to stop him. It was a strenuous battle, from what I could see, but she came through. The savior of Meridian.” Avad looked back at her with a wide grin that made her bashful. Like that, it was tough to maintain eye contact with him, or really either one of them. Erend didn’t seem to get angrier at it, though. He seemed not to mind having missed the battle at all, his only concern on something else.

“So is he dead? Is Dervahl dead? Where is he?” What truly angered him wasn’t missing the action, it was missing the opportunity to kill Dervahl himself. If someone else had killed him, Aloy knew that Erend would never forgive them.

“He’s not dead, he’s down at the cells. He’s going to stay there overnight, and no one is going to kill him.”

“ _What?_ ”

“Erend, he’s a wanted man in every Clan of the Claim. It’d be wiser not to kill him.”

“Oh, so you’re going to auction him off? Take the highest bidder? You can’t be fucking serious. He’s responsible for what happened to Ersa, Avad, and I’m not going to let someone else put him in the fucking ground but myself.”

“Our security depends on keeping the _peace_ , Erend. He will not be killed here.”

Erend glared Avad down with a face that sincerely scared Aloy, then stormed off down the steps, toward the city. She watched him go, and glanced over at the King, who was already looking at her, wearing an apologetic smile that told her everything that she didn’t want to know. She tried to cut him off before he said it, but she didn’t have the heart to.

“Aloy, could you go after him and make sure that he doesn’t further harm Dervahl? Please? I’ll owe you the world.” King Avad brought his hands together to complete the look, and Aloy only sighed, giving in to his request, as per usual. She was feeling better already, rested and healed, so stalking angry Erend for a minute or two shouldn’t be too much trouble. Unless, of course, he decided to do something dumb and thoughtless, like engage her in battle, but even having lost his mind, he probably still wouldn’t touch her. She doubted that he could. Plus, he could just be storming off to a tavern right now, and not actually to the cells.

She hoped that to be the case, but as she followed him through downtown Meridian and he passed by three taverns without as much as glancing at them, she knew that hoping for anything else would be fruitless. He went straight down to the cells, and didn’t have to search much to find his mortal enemy. Aloy stayed a good few feet behind, and hid behind a corner, peeking out a bit to keep watching him. If he hadn’t noticed her following him up until now, which he probably hadn’t, then she’d have to be careful to not give her position away this far into the mission. She watched him approach Dervahl’s cell like an animal, grabbing the bars and trying to shake them out of anger. Were they any less sturdy, she didn’t doubt that he actually could have. From her position outside, she couldn’t see Dervahl in the cell, only hear his surprised gasp.

“Hey, Dervahl, you son of a bitch, did you miss me? I haven’t seen your ugly face since the death of your favorite King. Why don’t you come closer, huh? Let’s chat a little.”

Dervahl laughed, and that didn’t make Erend happy. He tried to shake the bars again; his whole body was pressed up against them, as if trying to negate physics and phase through somehow.

“Erend, it’s been so long! We could’ve seen each other much earlier if you had come to the ambush with Ersa. Poor thing. I remember her, all alone after we jumped the Vanguard. She missed you so much in my study.” Dervahl laughed again, at how much impossibly angrier he had made Erend just now with only a few words, causing him to maul at the bars some more with his gloved hands.

“Shut the fuck up, don’t fucking talk about her. You have no right. You’re just a petty loser who saw the fall of his favorite King and, like a little child, wanted to burn the whole city to the ground, just because Ersa decided to make this a better place. Boo, fucking, hoo. All of that work, and what did it get you? A nice night behind bars before being auctioned off tomorrow to a bunch of fucking lunatics like a caged animal. Huh.”

“So you’re not here to kill me yourself? Honestly, I don’t know why I thought otherwise. You always have others do your killings, now I wonder if it’s because you’re a coward, or if it’s because you’re always too drunk to get the hit right? No surprise that Ersa didn’t want you fighting in the ambush. She dodged a bullet not calling you.”

“I’m going to kill you, Dervahl. I’m going to _fucking_ kill you. You won’t even get to see the bidding because the moment you’re out of town tomorrow, I’ll be there to greet you. This is a promise.”

Erend finally let go of the bars and stepped back, spitting on the ground in front of the cell before starting to walk away. Dervahl shouted a sarcastically gleeful goodbye after him, to his back, but it didn’t make him turn around. He continued on walking straight forward, and before he got too close, Aloy snuck back in hiding, her body pressed up to the wall. Running off now would completely blow her cover, so she stayed quietly in place, only hoping that he wouldn't come out over this way, and instead go out the other side. But of course he rounded _this_ corner, and saw her. Her blood froze when their eyes met, and the look on his face only made it worse. He was angry, still fuming from the encounter with Dervahl, and finding her spying on him right then didn’t help him cool off at all. Besides pure rage, the look that he gave her also held disappointment, but it only lasted a second. He didn’t stop to talk to her, or engage her in any way. He only shot her a dirty look while walking and continued to leave, as if shaking his head. It made her heart plummet, and she couldn’t do anything about it. Going after him now would only make it worse, she knew, so she went report back to Avad instead. Which ended up being a little awkward, because that was what Erend did, too, much to her surprise. He went right back to Avad’s little resting area with Aloy hanging back a few feet, feeling weird and unsure how to proceed. This had never happened to her before.

“Avad, Dervahl won’t make it far out of town tomorrow. I’m telling you this because I know he will be escorted out by your men, and you should have the option to save innocent lives over a handful of coin. I’m going to hijack the escort with the Vanguard the moment it’s out of Meridian, and if your men engage us, you’re going to lose them, so don’t be an idiot and sacrifice the innocent.” Erend’s voice was awfully stern, making each word that left him sound like a threat, which, by all means, should be more than only inappropriate when referring to one’s King. Aloy was shocked at this, but even more shocked at the fact that Avad didn’t feel hurt by it, or disrespected, or called the guards on him. Instead, he nodded thoughtfully, and replied in such a calm tone that she almost couldn’t believe it.

“They’ll be informed, and won’t pose dangerous to you. If they don’t immediately allow your attack, wait until the escort arrives at a more remote, and safe, location for it. Now, Erend, I only ask that you be patient.”

The two of them… Agreed on this? Avad wasn’t fighting Erend, or even trying to reason with him. He flat-out agreed with Erend’s resolution to go strictly against the royal orders given to him a minute earlier. This didn’t feel like something that a King would do; this felt like a break in hierarchy. Aloy watched Erend nod in response, then turn to look at her, his cold eyes freezing up the blood in her veins.

“Did you send her to spy on me?” He spoke to Avad, but his face remained turned to hers, making the question sting more because it was spoken as if she wasn’t even there. She frowned, but it might as well not have reached his dead heart.

“Yes. Don’t berate her, she was just following orders.” Avad talked in a tone that she hadn’t heard before, both protective in the face of danger but also somehow threatening, as if Erend could attack her at any moment. The atmosphere felt so heavy between the three of them that, at this point, Aloy just wanted to leave. She took a step back, feeling unwanted and hurt, her eyes still glued to Erend’s icy blues.

“I suppose my job here is done.” Her voice was shaky as she glanced over to Avad, and at his agreeing nod, she turned to leave.

“Thank you, Aloy!” The King shouted after her, but her head was so full of confusion and misunderstood feelings that she barely heard him, already halfway down the first flight of stairs, her feet working faster than she remembered them usually being.

For the first time ever, Meridian felt unwelcoming, in the same way that all of the settlements in the Embrace were objectively unwelcoming to her and to Rost throughout all of her nineteen years. Of course she knew that this wasn’t true, and the people in Meridian were perfectly sweet to her, in its majority anyway, and this feeling only overcame her in response to whatever had just passed between Erend and Avad. That had upset her a great deal, and sent her waddling out of the city, hugging herself through the storm in her brain. She couldn’t think straight, none of the thoughts in her head had a beginning or an end, and made no sense or point at all; they all just worked in unison to worsen her emotional state and push her near breaking point. She called for her mount and got on it, with no idea where to go, just knowing that she had to get away from here, so she rode it off to the first direction ahead of her. She made the Strider run, and felt the breeze in her hair, cleansing her mind, and washing off her soul. The heavy atmosphere from earlier peeled off of her skin as trees whipped past all around and the sky broadened above her, shining stars overhead. She breathed in, and out, and slowly allowed herself to calm down as her brain finally started to draw a blank in thought, the previous nebula clearing out. She slowly felt sane again.

The Strider began to lose speed, surely too worn to keep on running for now, but not that she minded. She let it slow down to a regular throttle and watched the scenery around her meander by. It was late, she noticed. The moon had been out for a while, and soon she’d need to find a place to stay, or set up camp in the middle of the wild. It was dangerous, but she had done it before and gotten away with it. A small tent in the forest, by a campfire. The thought felt lonely this time around. She had been by herself for a good while now, ever since Rost had passed, and this was the first time that she had truly felt lonely. Remembering him sent a pang to her heart, and it _hurt_ , it hurt bad, it constricted her chest and made her hug herself again, alone, lost in the woods, without a single friend. The cold look that Erend had given her… She couldn’t understand it. She didn’t know where it had come from, or what it had meant, but it drove her away from him, and now she realized that, for these past few days, he had been her only friend. Him and Nil. Or, did Nil even count? Last time she saw him, he told her where he would be for a while, in case that she needed him, and, maybe, right now, she did. Maybe she did, and maybe he’d be there, like he said that he would.

She turned the Strider around and rode to a small settlement four miles away.


	5. Intermission

The town was pretty much deserted at this hour. Most of the population was already in their homes, snuggled up in bed, and that worried her, because if Nil was tuckered in, then she’d never find him. She was hoping to run into him on the streets, if luck would grant her that much, but since that wouldn’t be the case, maybe she could ask around for him instead. A few feet up ahead, a shopkeeper was just putting all of her wares safely away for closing, so Aloy approached her to ask after her friend.

“Excuse me, madam, have you seen a man with a big, red Carja helmet, olive skin and white armor walking around these parts, by any chance? Black pants, no shirt?” She put her hands together and watched as the woman came to stop what she had been doing, her face looking up in thought for a moment. Luckily for Aloy, she had asked the right person.

“Yeah, he’s been lurking about for a couple of days. Should be in that pub over there at this hour.” Pub? Aloy glanced across the street at it, and her stomach dropped. She really hoped that he hadn’t been drinking. Not him, too.

Inside the pub, music was playing, people were dancing, people were drinking, and people were laughing. She wondered which one of them Nil was, and the further she went inside looking for him, the more worried she became. Loud revel engulfed the place in nothing but merry faces and drunken dancing, but the joyful mood of everyone around her didn’t touch her, and didn’t make her any happier, until her eyes fell on Nil’s face, sitting at a table by himself, watching the impromptu dancers with a wide smile on his lips. She really, really hoped that he wasn’t drunk. Everything inside of her rooted for his sobriety.

She approached him slowly, his eyes easily finding hers and spotting her in the crowd as she meandered over, his brows lifting in pleasant surprise at her sight. He watched her take the empty seat beside him with no objection, so maybe nobody had been sitting there in the first place, as she had rightly predicted.

“Aloy, I wasn’t expecting you. What are you doing here?” His voice showed nothing but delight, and she worried that the completely normal grin on his lips was due to alcohol intoxication. Because he was usually crazy, and everything in his facial expressions showed that all the time, except for right now, apparently. She searched his eyes, his face, his body language, anything that could prove her suspicion, but none of it was concrete enough evidence, so she went a step further and looked around him. The only item on the table was a cup, which he was holding, but it didn’t matter because she snatched it anyway, and brought it up to her nose. She ignored the look that he gave her as she sniffed the contents, then took a sip. The taste was relieving.

“Cranberry juice?”

Nil raised a brow at her, but didn’t mind her having another sip, although obviously finding that to be a strange behavior on her part. “Yes, that’s indeed cranberry juice. Why? Are you… Okay…?” He slit his eyes at her, looking suspicious as she put the cup down between her hands with a sigh. Fortunately, her worries were now irrelevant. Sober Nil could make for good company, and she wouldn’t have to be alone tonight, which was all that mattered. She turned to him and smiled, passing the cup back over.

“Yeah, sorry, I… I had a bad day, and… I was, I was closeby and thought that, maybe, you could, you know… Hang out, or… Or… Ah, fuck.” She covered her face with a hand, her eyes shutting closed as not to roll at herself. What was she trying to get at? Why was her first instinct to outright lie? She didn’t do that. Sure, she didn’t have an answer for him. She didn’t know exactly _why_ she was here, but that wasn’t an excuse to lie. Regardless, all she knew was that Nil was the first person that came to mind in a moment of panic, and she’d rather be around him right now than be by herself. Not after what happened with Erend, and how he had made her feel, and with only a single look, too. She wondered why _that_ had affected her so much. She sighed again, and dropped her hands to look at Nil. He was watching her curiously, but chose to stay quiet, which wasn’t him, and she wasn’t sure that she liked that, or if it meant anything good, either. For as much as she didn’t like it, though, for right now, she’d have to trust it.

“I don’t know why I’m lying to you. Sorry.” She was being completely honest this time, but still his eyes searched her carefully, trying to make her out, to understand her. To him, she wasn’t making any sense, and she honestly couldn’t blame him. She didn’t get herself, either.

“Aloy, is something bothering you? You’re acting weird.”

She took that into consideration, but the truth was that she really didn’t want to talk about it, and telling Nil of all people would be a big mistake, that was for sure. He wouldn’t understand the reason of her freaking out, or her feelings, which was fair, because she didn’t understand either of those herself, and trying to explain the inexplicable would only be a waste of time. Instead, she smiled politely, and reached over to touch his wrist. “I just… Don’t want to be alone tonight. Okay? I’ll be fine. It’s fine.” She met with his eyes, and they were more worried now than before. Less suspicious, but still actively trying to see through her. It made her anxious, that maybe he’d succeed at reading her, so she quickly opted for a distraction, and took the first idea that came to mind. Without thinking, at least not twice, she lounged forward, and closed the gap between their mouths in a kiss. It was clumsy, and she had probably hurt him, but she tried not to think about that, and instead focused on the feeling of his lips against hers. Still as soft as she remembered them being; no sturdy mustaches to tickle her skin. He kissed back, probably on auto-pilot, and touched her face, parting from her. She had forgotten how gentle he was, and that resonated well with her heart at the moment. He was surely looking at her again, but she avoided his eyes by staring at his lips instead.

“Is someone giving you a hard time?”

Yes, she thought, and for as much as Erend was the first person that came to mind, she’d have to revise that.

She leaned back and looked at him. “Yes, but…” She glanced around, at all the jolly faces, all the laughing dancers and the groovy musicians having a good time, and very loudly, too, surrounding the two of them and their table. It was obvious that this wasn’t the place for a serious conversation, it wasn’t the place for the heart to heart that Nil wanted to have with her. This tavern was supposed to lift her spirits, but she simply couldn’t connect with it, not with a head so full of confusing thoughts and mixed up feelings, so she took Nil’s hand and got up to her feet. “I don’t want to talk about it here.” The pointed look that she gave him alongside her line was perfectly well read, and made him get up after her with no objection, nodding at the entrance across the crowd to indicate it.

“There’s the door. Let’s talk outside.”

She couldn’t help the leap of her heart when he held her hand back, and they started pushing through the mass of people together.

Outside was silent, most of the town asleep at this hour, if not dancing at the pub, and the streets were populated only by the warm breeze that swept past. Nil made to let go of her hand, their destination already having been reached, but Aloy held on tight with both hands on his, instinctively keeping him closeby. He looked down at her, and for a moment she thought it would be to shake her off, but no, there wasn’t even a shadow of that intention in his eyes. Instead, they were kind, and soft, almost reminding her of Erend’s before… Well, before this evening. She frowned at herself, but thankfully had her attention redirected over to Nil just in time, as he spoke to her again.

“Where to next, or do you want to stay out here for a while?”

She looked up at him. His face was of soft consideration, his blue eyes still letting worry show through, but not that he had been trying hard to hide it, really. He was clearly more interested in listening to what she had to tell him than in the premise of sex, and that pushed her onto her tiptoes to kiss him again. She grabbed the side of his neck and pressed their lips together, closing her eyes as not to see the strange look that he was probably giving her right now, a second time. She honestly didn’t care to tell him of Erend, or even _think_ of Erend, not for at least a full minute of her life, which seemed far-fetched, taking into account just how obsessed she had been with him lately. No, she’d experience Nil for the moment, for all that he was, with no comparisons, and no tangent thoughts.

She knew that the answer to his question was either a motel room, or wherever he had been staying at in this town, even though he might not agree with it, because, for as nice as he had been earlier, he still had pushed her off, just not very obviously. She was honestly expecting something of the same caliber to happen again this time, but no. He kissed her back, and his tongue was sweet, and his hands held her waist firmly against his body, keeping her close so she wouldn’t lose balance on her tiptoes. It was strange to have soft hands on her body that didn’t hurt or leave marks behind, and to be kissing soft lips that didn’t bite to draw blood from her. She never thought that she’d come to appreciate something like this. She grabbed his face and pulled him down as the heels of her feet found the ground again; him easily complying and neither of them breaking apart. He touched her face, his fingertips brushed some of her hair behind her ear, and they were so feather light that she wondered if they had touched her at all. She had to take his hand and press it against her cheek to make sure that what she had felt was real. Nil didn’t mind that, he just kissed her, his round teeth scraped her bottom lip, and nothing hurt, and it started to drive her crazy. She needed to make this _feel_ like something, so she grabbed his collar bone hard, and kissed him harder, until their teeth clinked, and she bit his tongue, and she broke apart before he did.

“Do you have a room here?” She looked into his eyes, breathless, trying to read the judgement out of them, how much he surely thought that she was crazy, to track him down and show up out of nowhere, so randomly, looking troubled and yet dodging the subject when he poked at it, doing anything but talking about it, and instead hitting on him, leading him on, and killing any platonic thoughts that he might have had. It was almost ironic, how _he_ was supposed to be the insane one, and yet, here she was, acting even worse. To her surprise, despite everything, he didn’t look at her any differently. He didn’t judge her, or call her out; he just turned to glance at the inn that he had been staying at and nod over to it.

“In there.”

He took her hand, and walked alongside her.

“So why are you really here?” Nil spoke once they were in the room, and the door was closed behind the two of them. She had already removed the bracers from her forearms and was now stepping out of her boots, looking over at him with a brow raised, as if to indicate that he was talking crazy, when he was actually the only one making sense tonight. He didn’t fall for that, though, and started leisurely removing the armor from his arms on the meanwhile.

“You must’ve come here for a reason, and I refuse to believe you rode all the way from Meridian just for sex.” He placed the bracers and pauldrons down on the closest piece of furniture and watched her shrug in response, this time not looking at him, and instead focusing on unfastening the skirt around her hips. She didn’t have an answer that wouldn’t avalanche a snowball into a snowslide, so she’d opt for silence, for the moment. Telling Nil about her worries probably wouldn’t be as bad as she was making it to be, but the bigger problem was that she’d have to think about the issue that she’d rather not think about, and that, in itself, was already upsetting. She dropped the skirt on a chair and walked over to the bed, flopping down unceremoniously, face-first into the mattress. She sighed, and listened to Nil undress, then listened to his soft footsteps approaching the bed, and the weight of his body dip the mattress on the spot next to her. He touched her head, and his fingers running through her hair, unbeknownst to him, soothed her.

They laid next to each other, without saying a single word, for a good long while, with him idly playing with her hair, and almost making her fall asleep, as her nebulous thoughts slowly dissipated, and made way for a nice, calm moment, which was hard to come by, and she appreciated beyond belief. Ever since Erend became a more prominent part of her life, her easily overstimulated brain couldn’t catch a break and let her sleep. First, she couldn’t stop thinking about how great he made her feel, and now she couldn’t stop stressing over the opposite. Over the cold look that haunted her, and how invisible he had made her feel, something that had brought her back to every interaction with a Nora inside of the Embrace. It upset her more than it probably should have. She rolled over on the bed to lay on her side, and be able to look at Nil in the dark. He brushed hair out of her face, looking back at her with an expression that she had never seen on him before. It wasn’t manic, or bloodthirsty, or insane, which were what she was used to. No, this was something else. It was… Caring, and it almost scared her. Was this the beginning of another friendship? If so, then she only hoped that it wouldn’t take a sharp turn, like the one with Erend had.

“What’s bothering you, Aloy?”

She met with Nil’s eyes, and without the huge helmet on his head, he looked a lot less crazy and intimidating. He almost looked like a normal person, which was an unspeakably insane concept in itself, deceptive by nature. She reached over and touched his chest, feeling his heartbeat on her palm.

“Do you really want to know?” Her voice was quiet, nearing a whisper as she inspected his face. His eyes were fixed on hers, and watched her for a second, before he nodded his reply. She tried to grab his chest out of instinct to hold onto something, but all that her nails did was run softly over his skin. She could feel her own heart sinking before she even spoke the words. “I’ve grown weak. I’ve never seen myself so weak as I am now, and that’s… Frightening, to say the least. I don’t know what to do about it. I don’t know how to be strong again.”

“Weak how? You’re probably the strongest person that I know.”

“No, I’m not talking about performance strength in the battlefield, I’m talking about inner strength, you know? I used to be so self-sufficient. I did everything by myself, and I was fine with living by myself, and being my own company, but now… Now I can’t even sleep alone. And this is why I’m here. I just needed someone to make me company for tonight.”

“Seeking company isn’t a weakness, it’s a strength. It’s how we survive.”

“No, you don’t understand. I’ve never needed anyone. All that society has done for me was to teach me not to count with them, or to trust anyone. I’m an outcast in my own Claim, Nil. I’m not part of anything, and I don’t belong anywhere, not even in the Embrace. This is why I have to find my mother. She might have answers for me, and she might give me purpose. She might… Make me strong again.”

Nil nodded slowly, remaining in contemplative silence for a minute, probably thinking over everything that she had just dumped on him. She hadn’t been sure if sharing this with someone would make her feel better, but it surprisingly did. Even if it hadn’t solved a single thing, it still helped her feel lighter, less burdened, and that alone did a whole lot more than trying to work her way through the tangled thoughts that littered her head unassisted. She pushed herself up a bit, enough to close the distance between the two of them, and press a soft kiss to his lips. He responded in kind.

“Thank you for listening.” She whispered tenderly, touching the side of his face with a hand and the tip of his nose with her own. He smiled, but it wasn’t happy. If anything, it was brooding, but it didn’t worry her. She gave his lips a peck before moving up to straddle his waist. He only lifted a brow in reply and watched her, with an expression that pointed to him being delightfully entertained.

“Are we back to you trying to sleep with me now?” His voice was playful, and his grin complemented it, bringing a smirk to her lips on par with the joke. She shrugged, and placed two hands on his chest, using them as leverage to help her move her ass down over to his crotch.

“Maybe we are, or is that not interesting anymore?” She sat down and leaned back, squaring off her shoulders for emphasis, and watching the highly rewarding look on his face.

“I never said that it wasn’t.” He smirked, and his hands soon found her knees, grabbing them as if to keep her in place. His black hair stuck out in opposing directions with him lying down like this, and she wondered if it did the same when he stood. She dipped down and kissed him, tasted the sugar on his tongue as her ass ground down against his crotch. It was almost romantic how well those two things worked together. He ran both hands up her thighs and squeezed them, using that to bring her further down, heavier against himself. Despite how firm his hands were, they didn’t hurt at all. She wondered if that was a conscious action or not.

She grabbed his face with a hand and kissed him harder, her free palm touching down his chest, feeling every curve and every scar on the tip of her fingers, circling his navel and slipping past the waistband of his pants. His hands on her thighs squeezed them more, making her smirk into the kiss, and close a fist around his cock. Straddled under her and trapped, he couldn’t buck into her palm, and she’d get to decide how to treat him, but since he was always so nice with her, she’d be nice, too. She could never have imagined that Nil, of all people, would be a gentle lover. It was cute, really. She liked that. She lifted her hips from his crotch for some space and stroked, once, twice, twisted her wrist for a better position, and picked up pace. He sighed, or maybe moaned, into her mouth, and his nails dug into her pants, but only for a second, even if she didn’t mind it. She could feel him trying to thrust up under the weight of her body, and giving up right after; the motion probably just an instinctive reaction. She met with the bottom of the head on every upstroke, but didn’t actually rub it, only inched closer to it every time, drawing little sounds from him and swallowing them. The more this went on, the more he wanted to thrust up; his thighs tensed under hers and his hands moved up to her hips, trying to pull her down. The thought of riding him crossed her mind, and she stored it.

Her fist closed around the head and squeezed it, not letting that slow down her tempo, and only picking it up instead. She could feel the precum on her palm, spreading between her fingers as Nil stifled a moan against her tongue. She jerked him faster, her thumb swiped over the slit on every other stroke, and the sound of his groans, and moans, and rapid breathing fueled her with something extremely warm, and restless, that kept bringing back the thought of riding him, front and center, in her mind. Both of his hands left her hips, and slipped under her shirt. His warm palms ran up her back, sending goosebumps down her spine, down her arms, and up to her neck. She broke the kiss, and let go of his cock, to pull her shirt off, and fucking ride him already. She tossed her shirt aside, and went for his pants next, secretly enjoying the softness of his hands on her sides, up to her ribs, and cupping her breasts. He was gentle, and careful, and when his thumbs circled her nipples, she shuddered, keeping her eyes down at her own hands, watching intently as they pulled his pants down. He lifted his hips to make that easier for her, and she let him, lifting her weight off of him and kneeling above him rather than sitting now, one knee dug into the mattress on each side of him. She pulled his pants down just enough, and danced around to remove her own.

Nil wasn’t as big as Erend, so he didn’t hurt as much, but she didn’t find that to be something negative. Maybe it was even… Better this way, because as she sank down on him, it didn’t take her long to start feeling good. She grabbed both sides of his waist with her hands and held on for balance, slowly beginning to bob her hips against his, and taking his groans as encouragement. His hands roamed her body on the meanwhile, from her breasts down to her stomach and up her sides, always soft and sometimes squeezing, but still kind, in an appreciative light that she hadn’t experienced before, and would rather not think about. On the way down, she started to sink further, but gradually, with each of her sittings, until their hips began to meet every other time, and then every single time. She arched her back and threw her head back, let her eyes slip shut, as the world dissipated from around her, and all that existed was the feeling of him completely bottoming out, filling her up to the brim time, and time again. His hands settled atop her thighs, and he held them firmly before thrusting up to meet her hips halfway when they crashed down. The surprise of the first one drew a moan out of her, and the bliss of the following ones kept her vocal. She sank nails into his skin, and put some effort to stay within tempo.

The two of them moved in unison, with hands holding each other’s bodies, hanging onto each other, and breathless sounds escaping their throats to die within the walls of this room. Nil’s grip on her thighs only became firmer, stronger, the more their hips met, the more she sunk down on him, and she knew exactly what that meant. Which was perfect timing, because she had been growing tighter around him, and her legs threatened to snap shut, and she couldn’t wait to have him not pull out this time. The curiosity was killing her. She removed one hand from him, her nails leaving deep dents behind, and rubbed herself, absently throwing her head back again. She was clutching, but Nil didn’t stop; maybe even thrusted upward harder, she didn’t know. She could barely pay attention to anything other than her own body, and how pleasure quickly became too overwhelming to bear, building up in between her legs, until it was too much, and she slammed down against him, pulsing. Her legs were too weak to keep going, but Nil came through for her, thrusting through her orgasm, and hitting his, too, on the meanwhile. She was glad that he couldn’t, and didn’t, pull out, expecting to point out the differences between him and Erend, but coming up short. In this case, there were none, and it pretty much felt the same, both times. She sighed as their bodies slowly stilled together.

Lying beside Nil in the dark, and catching her breath, Aloy found herself thinking of Erend again. She thought of the night before, how drunk he was, what he had said to her, and how closely they had slept until morning. Could that have been considered a cuddle? She frowned up at the ceiling, then turned her head to look at Nil right next to her. It was dark, but not enough to completely blind her. She could see his silhouette, and his face, and he could see hers, too. He turned to meet with her shiny eyes.

“Nil, have you slept with a drunk person before?”

He smirked in the dark, and she could picture just how cocky it was. She hated it, but also kind of wanted to kiss it. “I knew you’d get to _really_ talking after getting off.”

“Just… Answer my question.”

“Yes, I have. I think everyone has.” A pause. “You’re not drunk, are you?”

“No, it just happened to me recently. He was extremely drunk, to the point of not even remembering what we did, and said that he loved me and… And I don’t know what to do about that. It’s freaking me out, really.”

“Oh, it happens all the time, it’s fine. Just don’t believe it.”

“Don’t believe it?”

“Yeah, don’t believe it. If he didn’t even remember saying it, then I bet you that he didn’t mean it.”

“How does that make sense?”

“You can’t give credit to something a drunk person said, Aloy.”

“But…” She closed her mouth. That made sense, and she didn’t really have a good counter for it, but somehow, it still felt like it needed figuring out, needed further explaining. From Erend, more than anyone. She wanted to hear it from him, that he didn’t mean it, and that he shouldn’t have said it, drunk or otherwise. “I need to speak with him about that, and… About something else, too. I think I’ll do that tomorrow.” If she got up early enough, maybe she would be able to catch him before he got his hands on the prisoner to do as he wished. Although, perhaps it’d be a smarter idea to approach him afterwards, when Dervahl already laid six feet under, and Erend should be, probably, calmer. His steadfast seeking of vengeance and blood frightened her, and she only hoped that offing Ersa’s murderer would bring him some peace of mind, or at least a sense of accomplishment that would make him feel more complete about the whole thing.

“Can I ask what the second thing is?”

“It’s nothing important, it’s just something dumb that, um, that I’d like to address with him, is all. He… Well. He’s in mourning, so maybe I overreacted, but feelings should be validated, right? They matter, and they _mean_ something, right? Or maybe I should just… Forget about it. I guess that would be easier.”

“No, no, don’t forget about it. Don’t ignore it. If he made you feel something bad, then confront him about that. Don’t let him get away with it. He didn’t hurt you, did he?”

“No, he just scared me. He didn’t do anything to me, honestly just scared me.”

“How?”

“He was shouting, saying these awful things to this man, being really aggressive, and it scared me. He’s big, and very strong, and, look, I’m good with a spear, I’ll tell you that, but he’s someone that I’d rather not cross. I don’t know. He wouldn’t attack me, of course not, but, you know?”

Nil was silent for a moment, taking all of this into consideration and looking deeply into the shine of her eyes, the dimly-lit portion of her face, the worry in the crease of her brow. He looked at her, and took her hand into both of his. “Aloy, he drinks, he’s big, and he’s aggressive. Please… Stay away from men like that. It’s the recipe for disaster. Trust me.”

“No. No, he’s not like that. He’s sweet, and he’s kind, and he’s nice. He’s just in a bad place right now because of his sister but I promise you that he’s not dangerous.”

“Shit, Aloy…”

“Nil, I’m serious. Listen to me. He’s not a menace, and he’s not going to hurt me, either. Even if he ever tried to.”

“Look, I don’t doubt that you can take down anyone, but just watch out, alright? He sounds like trouble.”

“I’ll be fine, Nil. I’ll speak with him tomorrow and clear this all up.” She brought their intertwined hands to her lips and kissed the back of his. Despite their differing points of view, she appreciated his concern for her, knowing that he only wished her best, her safety and happiness and all of that. He might’ve been a murderous psychopath that raided bandit camps for the fun of it, and the bloodbath, but he surprisingly cared for her, more than she thought that he would, and she deeply appreciated that. She’d watch out for him, too, and their friendship wouldn’t be taken lightly by her, not anymore.


	6. Tying Up Loose Ends

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Alternatively,
> 
> Intermission II: Erend.

“Where are you headed now?” Aloy asked while accompanying Nil out of the inn; the two of them already checked out and with no pendencies left behind. The sun shone brilliantly above them, but since it was still so early, it wasn’t smouldering hot yet, just warm enough to make this morning a pleasant one. At this hour, she guessed that the Royal Escort was either nearing its destination, Dervahl’s last stop, or Erend had already gotten the revenge that he so aggressively seeked. She hoped for the latter.

“To Blackwing Snag, not too far from here. I know that you’ve got your own affairs to deal with today, but if you’d like to show face there at some point, you’re welcome to. You might even make it in time to tag along.”

“Thanks for the invitation, Nil, but I have to pass up on this one. Maker’s End really can’t wait for me any longer, and I’m only stopping in Meridian for a moment to speak with Erend. I’m in something of a hurry.”

Nil nodded, wearing a half-smile on his lips that she couldn’t very well read. “Maker’s End… Isn’t it just by that Shattered Kiln camp? I’ve been meaning to go up there for the longest time. It’s a damn shame that you’ll beat me to it.”

“Maybe we can race for it?” She grinned playfully, engaging him with a bounce of the brows that got her a wide grin in reply, and one that she knew what meant. He liked the joke, but it was only that. “You know, you can go up there after you’re done here. It’s not like I’m coming back very soon, anyway.” In other words, company would do her good. She liked that idea.

“Huh, I don’t know… Would you feel better if I did?” He raised a brow down at her, and under his piercing blue eyes, she suddenly blushed. She hadn’t thought of that in this kind of light, and he made an embarrassing point more transparent than she ever wanted it to be. Having him closeby, or just the knowledge of his being closeby; having a _friend_ in the near vicinity made her feel more secure, safer, about going on an unknown journey to a place that she had never been before, so far away, by herself. She didn’t know what to expect from those ruins, and if anything should deviate from the plan, or if anything went wrong, she’d have someone nearby to provide her with backup. In a similar note, the idea of speaking with Erend _before_ leaving wasn’t only to clear up the misunderstanding between them, but also to secure their friendship, so she could count on him as well, if needed, for anything.

“Yes, actually. I would.”

“Alright, then I’ll go. If you need me and can’t find me at the camp, try Sunfall. I’ll probably be there instead. I might leave tomorrow morning, or maybe even tonight. I don’t know. We’ll see.”

After parting from Nil, and whistling for her mount, Aloy rode off back to Meridian in much higher spirits than when she had fled it the day before. Nil had made her feel incredibly validated, which, as it turned out, was exactly what she needed. She actually got to kiss him goodbye this time, too, from her own volition, even if not so much from his. She had been meaning to do that for a while now. He was a little taken aback by it, but ultimately didn’t mind it. He only smiled a bit and shook his head before bidding her a definitive farewell.

On the Broadhead’s back, the ride over didn’t take long, and soon Aloy found herself entering the gates of Meridian Village. Her mount had to remain outside, but that wasn’t a problem. She jumped off of it and trotted through the dirt paths of the little town, eager to find the man who simply reigned over her thoughts, and was probably degutting someone else right now. At this hour, the Royal Guard was sure to already have dispatched of Dervahl, but asking around for confirmation wouldn’t do any harm, so she approached a couple of Carja soldiers standing guard by the elevator for information. If the Escort didn’t take this path, then they must’ve walked out through the front entrance with the colossal bridge instead.

“Good morning, soldier. Am I late for the Escort? Have they already passed?”

“Yes, huntress, I’m afraid they have, and they came back quite a while ago, too.”

“Hm, that’s a shame.” It wasn’t, really. It was great, because it meant that she was on the right track. Her right hand lifted up to her Focus and pressed it on as she glanced down, her eyes searching the dirt beneath her feet for a group of footprints obviously marching together.

“Thank you, soldier.” She spoke absently, already trekking off after the marks that she had been looking for. The man responded in kind back to her, but she barely paid him any mind now, too busy following the tracks on the ground that took her over to the Royal Maizelands, down some curvy paths in between distinct crops and across a little bridge, leading into a dense forest. This was the perfect kind of place to murder a person unseen, and either hide the evidence or simply carry the body to be dumped in a different location. She wondered if Erend had put any thought into that. Jogging after the tracks, through bushes and flowers and foliage and tree after tree, concealed from the sunshine under the thick tree tops and nearly getting lost in the disturbing vastness of the wilderness, she finally arrived at the crime scene.

It was a small clearing in the middle of the forest, where five Vanguardsmen stood with their weapons drawn, facing her upon immediate sight, a shocking and surprising confrontation. She froze, and they all froze as well, but only for the second that took them all to recognize each other. The Vanguard put their hammers away then, grinning behind their helmets while sighing in relief, even laughing a bit. Aloy relaxed, too, and at their permission to freely roam the area, she decided to take a look around. Dervahl’s bloody corpse lay in the center of the clearing, and right by it a few of Erend’s men had been digging a grave. They went back to it as she approached the body, slowly, but it didn’t take her much to notice that Dervahl had been decapitated. There were big squirts of blood sprinkled all around him, on the leaves and on the flowers, but nothing on the Vanguard. They were squeaky clean, not counting the dirt on the ones busy with the grave, which meant that Erend was, probably, anything but. The thought made her nauseous, and also got her wondering his whereabouts, since he didn’t seem to be around. She pressed the Focus on again, and searched the ground for blood that might’ve dripped from him, which was the easiest thing to do, because Erend had left a big, red mess behind him, everywhere through the forest. She turned back to the Vanguard, bid them farewell, and started after the bloody track.

She followed the droplets of blood on the leaves and the smears on the trees all the way down to the river that flowed out of Meridian Village, and nourished the Royal Maizelands. Erend must’ve sat here to rest, and wash off, because the fresh blood track ended here, but his footsteps continued forward, along the river a few feet, and across the bridge. He took the long way round back to town, and the elevator up to downtown Meridian. She got lost in the footsteps once up there, since far too many people wandered from marketplace to marketplace and nothing about his heavy steps was strikingly apparent or told them apart from everybody else’s, but if she had to guess, he was either at a pub or at home. If not, then perhaps at the palace. She’d check the pub first, though, out of consistency.

Walking in, and seeing how empty it was, Erend was less than difficult to find. He sat at the far end of the bar, in full armor, as he usually was, leaning his head in a hand, which worried Aloy a bit. She thought that he’d be feeling better after putting Dervahl down and bringing Ersa some justice, but apparently not. That wasn’t what his body language told, nor the fact of his being in the pub alone, with no sight of a cheering Vanguard anywhere. She approached him carefully, and took the empty seat beside him, with no response or apparent acknowledgement from him. He must not have noticed her presence, his mind surely too filled up with conflicting thoughts to pay his surroundings any attention, so she took that moment to glance about him. What struck her most was that he hadn’t washed off at the river earlier, like she wrongly supposed, because the front of his armor was absolutely drenched in blood, dry by now, so he must’ve sat down by the water for a good while before leaving, doing much of nothing. She wondered about his motive, and what he must've been doing for so long, since he hadn’t used that time to clean up. She turned to him, and leaned closer.

“Erend?”

He lifted his head to look at her. His bloodshot, puffy eyes were doleful and soft, posing a perfect contrast with the blood spillage that colored his white skin red. The sight didn’t shock her as much as it worried her. The top of his head and the sides of his face were impeccably clean, the droplets cutting off in right angles, meaning that he had worn a headpiece during the execution, and discarded it somewhere prior to visiting the pub, once that it wasn’t on the counter next to his bloody gloves, or really anywhere in sight.

“Aloy.” He cracked a half-grin that held little to no joy, but she couldn’t find it in herself to feel offended by it. He was still in mourning, after all. “Fancy meeting you here, baby. What gives?” He was slurring _bad_ , almost as bad as the other night, and for as much as she wasn’t surprised about it, it was still something of a disappointment to have found him here. She honestly thought that he’d be feeling better by now.

Incidentally, “baby”?

She raised a brow at that, but decided to let it slip by unmentioned. “I was hoping to find you so we could talk.” Her eyes trained on his, unfaltering, but to no use, because he barely looked back. His glassy blues only skimmed over her face, and never seemed to focus anywhere longer than on her mouth, which greatly vexed her.

“Yeah?” He responded absently, reaching over to graze his fingertips along her jawline. She leaned away from the touch, annoyed at his lack of attention.

“I’d like to talk about yesterday.”

His eyes finally met hers, even if only for a second, before they dropped back down to her lips, following along her jaw, and down to her neck. “Okay.” He touched her neck, and his fingers were warm on her skin, but she wouldn’t allow for that to persuade her again. He was _drunk_ , and evidently horny, and she could easily take advantage of him a second time--third?--if she wanted to, and get absolutely nothing accomplished on the way of clearing yesterday’s misunderstandings, but that would only defeat the whole purpose of her coming here in the first place. So, no. She took his hand and held it, squeezing it to snap him back to reality.

“Erend, I need you to listen to me.”

“I am, I’m listening. I’m right here.”

If that was true, he certainly didn’t look like it. He seemed more capable of spacing out at any moment than listening to a word that she was saying, with blue eyes next to closing, and a bloodstream too far down the bottle to allow him a considerable amount of focus on anything. For all that she knew, he could forget this conversation the moment it happened, so maybe speaking with him right then wasn’t such a great idea, and waiting for a more opportune moment would be a smarter approach to it. She sighed, and loosened the grip on his hand, gently tracing his knuckles with her thumb.

“Nevermind, it’s not that important. We can talk later, when you’re sober.”

He laughed, making her look at him. “When’s _that_? I’m not getting sober until…” He cut himself short very abruptly, and shut his mouth, turning to glance down at the cup before him. He picked it up with his free hand and finished off whatever was left at the bottom, then immediately ordered a refill. Aloy gripped his hand tighter.

“Until what, Erend?” She leaned closer and her eyes shone with curiosity, wide as saucers because, maybe, this could explain his heavy drinking, and would be the answer to her worries about him. It was something that he had let slip, and she’d hold onto it. He shook his head, dismissing the topic entirely, but she wouldn’t let it go.

“Until nothing. Doesn’t matter. Forget that I said anything.” He watched the bartender pour him another, and knocked it back for a big swig. Aloy tugged on his arm for attention.

“Until Dervahl’s dead? Until Ersa is avenged? You already did all of that, and you were successful. You got your revenge. What more--”

“I _know_ , Aloy. I know that. I know he’s dead, and I’m bathed in his blood to prove it.”

“Then why aren’t you rejoicing?”

“Because I thought it’d feel better than this. I thought that killing him would make me feel good, righteous or something, accomplished, fulfilled, and all of that shit, but the truth is that it didn’t change a single goddamn thing. Ersa’s still dead, and I still have to bury her. She’s not coming back to me, regardless if I hunted Dervahl down or not. She’s gone, Aloy, _really_ gone, and I’m still here, miserable.” He lifted the cup back to his mouth and tipped it far back, before putting it back down on the counter. This time not asking for a refill. Aloy squeezed his hand, trying to read the side of his face offered to her, but it was mostly turned away, and she’d hate to think that he was crying again. She hadn’t meant to push him like this.

“I’m really sorry, Erend.” Her words were a whisper of consolation that made him shake his head, hiding his face in a palm. He was clearly hurting, and probably could use of some privacy, so she kissed his knuckles, and got up to kiss the uncovered side of his face as well. She made sure to leave a big one on his cheek before excusing herself, but Erend took her arm just as she stepped back. He met with her eyes again, and his watery blues tugged at her heart.

“No, please. Stay.”

She couldn’t refuse that, and with a heavy heart, sat back down next to him, feeling the weight of the world sag her shoulders. She couldn’t begin to imagine how he felt. He sniffled and wiped at his eyes with both hands, then cleared his throat, as if that would make a difference. “Can we go to my place? I’m done here.” His voice was clearly strained, but not yet hoarse, even if his eyes were redder than before. Aloy wasn’t sure how to reply to his question, because for as much as she wanted to keep him company, she didn’t want another encounter with him drunk. It wouldn’t feel right, especially not at a time like this, and walking him home without that intention wouldn’t be clear to him. It’d give him the wrong impression. She watched him wipe at his eyes again, making the skin redder from the rubbing.

“I’ll take you home, but that’s all there’s to it, alright?” Her voice was soft, and he nodded in reply, not fighting it.

He was drunker than his working cognitive thinking had led her to believe. He could speak, but could barely walk, and she actually had to provide him with physical support this time. She had an arm around his waist, and the weight of his own across her shoulders brought back a déjà vu of her first evening in Meridian, when this exact scene played, only a lot better rehearsed. This time he was stumbling over himself far too much, and threatening to fall above her with every other step, which got her picturing just how exactly he made it home by himself in situations like this, or if one of the Vanguard usually helped him across the plaza. She worried after him, and her good conscience gripped him tight by her side and kept him on his feet all the way over to his front door. It was far too early in the day for this sort of nonsense, and the town was beginning to stare, but not that she really minded, or that Erend noticed. He leaned heavily against the frame and handed her the key, since he very clearly was in no condition to unlock this door. She wondered if he usually kicked it down when unassisted.

The first thing he did once inside was remove the bloody armor, and place it rather unceremoniously on a piece of furniture for the warden to clean and polish later. Aloy just stood shyly by the front door, leaning against it a bit while watching Erend open the furthermost door to the right, nearly hidden under the curve of the staircase, where a small, but lavishly decorated, bathroom was. He leaned down to wash his face, and she wondered if the kiss that she had given him had been placed over a smear of dried up blood. She honestly hoped not, but the worry served her right for not double-checking beforehand, because trying to wipe it off of her mouth now would be good for nothing. Erend dried his face on a towel and left for the stairway, passing her a glance on the meanwhile and absently reaching a hand for her to take. He had literally never done this before, and it took her rather by surprise, but she found herself stepping forward and grabbing his fingers anyway. Deep down, she knew that she shouldn’t accompany him up to his room, but whatever. It wasn’t the end of the world, and she could still save the showcasing of her pure intentions. She absolutely wouldn’t sleep with him tonight, not in this condition, and no amount of coercion would change her mind about it.

In his room, and still with the door left wide open, he finished stripping down to nothing, uncaring whether or not she decided to watch. It didn’t shock her when he slipped his shirt off overhead, but when his hands found the waistband of his pants, she promptly turned away. Of course she had seen him naked before, and he obviously didn’t mind her being in the room right now, but she still shouldn’t look, because this was nothing if not the door to temptation, and she would _not_ budge. Not this time. She’d be firm, and stay true to herself, and not sleep with him tonight, but maybe one single glance wouldn’t be so bad, it surely wouldn’t change her steadfast resolution, so she took a peek out of the corner of her eye, very quickly, and his ass reminded her of the other night, in bed with him, drunk as all Hell, when she slapped him to roll off. That had been good, it was a good night, and he was good, too, and she breathed in deeply, deeply, until her lungs threatened to explode, and held her breath. No, that was a counterproductive thought. Thinking of his naked body above hers wouldn’t help her case. She breathed out, slowly, and let her mind cleanse of sin.

Once again clothed, Erend got in bed and straddled the mattress, beckoning her over with a hand, to join him. She strongly hesitated, with feet well planted on the expensive rug below her, but his tired blue eyes looking up at her were too much, and for as much as she wanted to break the stare, she couldn’t. The spell worked, and she gave in. She hopped into bed with him, but not with an agenda, only to make him platonic company. At least, that was what she told herself, a second before kissing him on the mouth. She closed the distance between them and met his lips with hers, kissing him hard, and having him respond to it sweetly, rather than roughly, which was out of character for him, even if she didn’t mind it. She kissed him, and tasted the ale on his tongue, and on his palate, and deep, deep down, she didn’t care. She honestly didn’t care that he was drunk again. She had missed him, the nice and caring person that he really was, so strikingly different from the cold man that had possessed him the day before, and despite how he had made her feel last night, it didn’t change her feelings for him. Nothing could change how much she simply adored him, so she kissed his soft lips more, holding his face in both of her hands. The beating of her heart felt so strongly in her chest, so intensely, that it almost left her breathless. She had noticed that this sort of thing kept happening with Erend time and time again, the palpitation, the eagerness, the breathless enthusiasm. He had an impressive power over her that she just couldn’t explain.

Erend’s hands were warm on her waist, and when he moved them over to the front of her skirt, she broke the kiss. Instead of unfastening her belt, he held onto it, and only met with her eyes.

“Erend, I’m not here to sleep with you.” She spoke in a whisper, so close to his lips that he might as well have felt the words on his skin, and took his hands in hers, away from her clothes. He looked puzzled, frowning slightly down at her.

“Why not?” He was still slurring badly, and it almost made her smile, because the reason was so clearly obvious, right under his nose, and yet he was blind to it. She leaned over and kissed him again, this time chaste and sweet.

“Because you’re drunk, and need rest.” At that, she began to push him to lay his back on the bed, and found no resistance from him, as had been expected. She laid him down, and straddled his waist, still holding both of his hands in hers. He watched her with half-lidded eyes, too drunk to contest anything.

“Since when is that a problem?”

“Since it’s always been.” She brought both of his hands up to her lips, and kissed them, before rolling off of him. He had objected to her leaving before, back at the tavern, and since not much had changed during the walk over, trying to leave his room now would probably reward her with the same pleas. Letting him rest by himself, unaccompanied, would be fruitless, so she laid down next to him on the mattress, on her side to look at him. His head was turned to face her, as well, and he still wore the same confused look from before.

“You want me to… Sleep? Seriously?” He raised a brow as she nodded in response, smiling a bit, and reaching to touch his arm.

“Don’t worry, I’ll be here when you wake up. I’m not going anywhere.” Technically, she _had_ somewhere to be, but it didn’t mean that her journey couldn’t be postponed for a few hours. Her riding for Maker’s End a little bit later than expected wouldn’t keep anybody waiting, and Nil would only arrive much, much later after her, anyway. This wasn’t an inconvenience. She touched the milky skin of Erend’s forearm, and ran her fingertips up to his wrist, feeling the few scar bumps on the way. He yawned.

“Okay, you win, but try to rest, too.” He took her hand and kissed it, letting it rest on his chest before closing his eyes. She hid half of a smile into the pillow by him, feeling her own heart double up in size.

She liked him so much.

As hours passed and the sun gradually closed in on the horizon, Aloy began to seriously consider his offer of a nap. While Erend slept, she spent the time messing with her Focus, and catching up on the files that she had encountered before, during her adventures, but had been in too perilous a situation to stop and read them, all the while listening to the soft snores of her friend, and feeling the rhythmic beating of his heart right on the back of her hand. It didn’t take her too long to run out of news in the archive, though, and idleness coupled with the pleasantly dim, quiet atmosphere of the room began to weigh on her eyelids. She closed them once, telling herself that she’d only rest for a minute, and blacked out entirely.

Aloy woke up to the sound of running water. The sky was pitch black by then, but the moon wasn’t out yet, which was a good sign, that it was still early into the evening, and she hadn’t completely slept through it. She moved up to a sitting position, stretching on the meanwhile, on par with Erend’s absence, and guessing that he was the one responsible for the noise. His room only had one door inside of it, that led to a bathroom, which was left partially open, meaning that he surely was in the shower. She could walk in at any moment if she wanted to, but lucky for him, she was an educated guest, and they weren’t close enough for that kind of behavior from her. Plus, accidentally sleeping in all of her gear had been counterproductive, because now she had a mark on her cheek from sleeping on the bracers and her hips ached from the tassel, but nothing too bad that wouldn’t pass in a matter of minutes. She hopped to the floor, fixed herself up, and sat down on a ridiculously comfortable armchair, by a coffee table, near one of the wide windows that lined a wall of the room, waiting for Erend to be done. She wasn’t sure why he needed such a big room, filled with so many chattels, but then again, she didn’t understand the lifestyle of anyone with this much money in the first place.

The shower cut off, and Erend soon emerged from the bathroom, clad in a single white towel that hung low on his hips. He grinned at her sight, delighted to see her awake, and she smiled back up at him, pretending not to stare. From the looks of it, he pretended not to notice. He greeted her in passing and went over to the armoire to change, and even though he had his back to her, openly inviting her to watch, she pulled on the curtains closest to her seat and glanced out the window instead, down, down at the dense forest that surrounded Meridian. She watched the leaves on the trees move with the breeze, and the few machines far in the distance lighting a path through the darkness. Meridian was built so far above the valley that, from Erend’s window, the people walking about the Maizelands were about the size of Aloy’s nails. They still reaped and sow at this hour, so it probably wasn’t quite as late as she thought it was. Napping well into the afternoon always messed up her notion of time.

“Are you staying in town long, Aloy?” Erend asked from across the room, catching her attention and making her glance over at him. Thankfully, he was fully dressed by now, even if the white shirt that he wore looked far too good on him. She smiled warmly, but it wasn’t a joyful one.

“No, I’m leaving soon. I have to find my mother.” At the last word, Erend’s brows lifted in surprise. He hadn’t been on par with her own doings and motivations ever since her arrival, far too preoccupied with his sister at the time, looking for her, and with reason, too. Aloy didn’t blame him for being too engrossed in his own life to pay hers much attention. In his defense, he had been in awful jeopardy for the last few days.

“Your mother? I assume she knows Olin, then?” He crossed the room and sat down on the armchair directly next to hers, both by the coffee table and with a gorgeous view of the night sky that hung over Meridian, even if their eyes laid elsewhere.

“No… He came across her image, only, but it’s a starting point. By his word, I’m headed to Maker’s End next.”

“Those ruins up north?” Erend frowned, and continued to even after her replying nod, but decided against arguing this strange logic, which was relieving, because she wouldn’t know what to say to him, either. Olin had pointed the way, however odd it was, and she would follow, hoping for the best. For _something_ , at least. “Alright. When are you leaving?”

“Tonight.” The word spilled out before she could swallow it back, bringing further surprise to the rise of his brows. He blinked once, in the sudden silence that settled between them. One that she daren’t break.

“Tonight.” He echoed back at her, more morose and thoughtful than she would’ve liked to hear from him, but then again, this wasn’t his business to comment on, even if he wanted to. He just nodded slowly, and the vagueness in his eyes let show the remorse that he was feeling deep inside, probably at himself, for one reason or another, that Aloy couldn’t read off of him. “That’s definitely pretty soon. I was, um… I was hoping to have a little more time with you than just, uh.” He glanced out the window, at the darkness outside, then back at her, his eyes shining under the moonlight, in the familiar way that she had come to adore. “Just a couple of minutes, I guess.” He looked woefully sad about her parting. He looked absolutely devastated, and it jabbed painfully at her heart. She could well leave by the early morning instead of right now, but chose not to. She had accommodated to his plans up until now, and wouldn’t bend hers to favor a man that she barely knew… Even if she breathlessly adored him. It was a matter of principle.

“Will I see you again, Erend?”

He smiled, absolutely engulfed in sorrow, which was something that she, in a way, perhaps with less intensity, related to, for the moment. “I really hope so.” He reached for her hand to take, but she was quicker than him, and went a step forward, too. She leaned over the armrest of her seat to plant a kiss on his mouth instead, surprisingly meeting him halfway, with his soft lips crashing against hers in something far more sweet than it probably should’ve been. She smiled, thinking to herself how in the world she could’ve missed his mustache so much. Perhaps her adoration for him ran deeper than she knew.

“Is this what you needed to speak with me about?” He asked her as they parted, and the sound of his voice glued on the skin of her lips that still tingled of him. She glanced up to meet with his baby blues, for a moment lost in the question, but too soon being flooded with vivid imagery from yesterday, of his stone cold face, mere hours after the drunken declaration of his love. She pulled back, and cleared her throat, while looking down between them. This was a nice moment that she didn’t really want ruined, and it was still too soon to relive those memories without strong emotional attachment to them, so she hesitated. Maybe letting it pass, for right now, would be a better idea, even if Nil had told her not to. His advice had come from the heart, and she truly appreciated him for that, but it didn’t mean that she’d follow it.

“Yes, actually.”

“Didn’t it have to do with yesterday?”

“No, I don’t believe so. You must’ve misheard me.”

“Oh.” Erend nodded pensively, then looked back at her with an apologetic crease in his brow. “Hey, I’m sorry about, you know, earlier. That whole thing at the pub. It wasn’t fair to you.” He looked worried, but above all, embarrassed, although she didn’t understand the reason for it. Mourning a loved one was human, and showed that he cared dearly for his sister. Being open about something like that shouldn’t be a problem, and if anything it should be normalized. Aloy took his hand.

“Don’t worry about that.” She kissed his knuckles before getting up, and slowly let go of them, with eyes trained on Erend’s face, memorizing it just in case. “I’ll be off, then.” Their hands slipped apart and she turned around to leave.

While on the back of a Charger going at full speed across the desert, she didn’t understand why tears began to spill down her cheeks.


	7. Maker's End

Maker’s End was both a bust, and a treasure chest of information. On one hand, Aloy found out the woman’s name: the one person who she came all this way for was called Elisabet Sobeck. On the other, well… There were a lot of downs to this little, and extremely dangerous, exploring that she had just done. Elisabet might, or might not have been her mother. She also might, or might not have been dead. She was surely not in the ruins, even if holograms of her speaking with Ted Faro were aplenty. She was one of the Old Ones, and apparently a very important person to the overall history of humankind, since she seemed to have singlehandedly saved it with a mysterious project called Zero Dawn. Faro had been responsible for the creation of the self-riding machines, and the error in their coding that caused them to go rogue, threatening mankind with extinction, and Elisabet, somehow, remedied that with what she had at the time.

These discoveries brought more questions than answers to Aloy, and caused the unknown caller that had been keeping an eye on her through her Focus, for the longest time, to finally reveal himself. A man named Sylens, who clearly had ulterior motives behind his steadfast interest in Project Zero Dawn, but ones that Aloy couldn’t demystify. They tried to piece together some of the information that she had just unlocked, but it was all mere speculation, and since Sylens seemed to be in such a hurry, their call was soon disconnected, leaving Aloy once again to her thoughts, and her own devices. Before going, however, he pointed the next significant bit of ruins for her to explore. From the conversation between Sobeck and Faro, Aloy knew that she had to visit the U.S. Robotics Command, and Sylens let her know that, nowadays, this place was called the Grave Hoard, and couldn’t be further away from Maker’s End. No wonder Elisabet didn’t go on foot herself.

Aloy rappelled down the tower, and once again on fluffy, snowy ground, she started the morose ride back to civilization.

She missed Erend. It felt strange to think of him so out of nowhere, but given that she had last seen him about a week ago, the empty sentiment only seemed to aggravate with each passing day. She wondered if he was still in Meridian, and regretted not asking him, when she had the chance, where his future would take him in the following days. If he’d stay there at all, or leave for good, never to come back. The last thought frightened her. Surely she’d find a way to see him again if that were truly the case, for Avad probably knew where he’d be. Once, she believed the Sun King to be in charge of the Vanguard, but ever since that terrifying night, when Erend spoke so authoritatively with the King, she wasn’t very sure anymore. Perhaps it was quite the opposite, and Erend was truly free to take his business elsewhere, with the Vanguard right behind him for support, while Avad had no say in it. Was one in charge of the other, or were they cooperating alongside each other? It was difficult to tell. Aloy only hoped that Erend hadn’t moved from Meridian yet, and she could easily find him at his enormous house whenever it striked her fancy to. If only anything were that easy.

Riding south, she eventually came to face a crossroads, where the path forward would take her further down, closer to Meridian, while the left exit would bring her to Shattered Kiln. Nil hadn’t told her exactly how long he’d stay there, if he truly went at all, but she hoped not to be too late to see him. It had been quite a while since she had last encountered any friendly, or familiar company, and as it seemed to be the case with the two of them these days, she seeked him when in need of something. Be that company, moral support or peace of mind, Nil provided, without minding the trouble, or at least, not showing to. She promptly took the exit, and sped down the dirt path.

Shattered Kiln was incredibly populated by the time she arrived, brimming with merchants and newcomers looking for a settlement to live in. She looked around for her friend, and a few Carja wearing headdresses similar to Nil’s faked her out, brought her to worry that she were too late, and slowly killed her hopes to see him again. The worst part was that she didn’t know where he was headed next, and since he had no acquaintances in common with her, she wouldn’t know who to ask after him. He could probably find her back in Meridian if he needed her, because she had spoken of it to him before, but the problem was that he never did. She was always the one going after him instead. She sighed, and her heart sank as she made her way through the crowd back outside. The sun was just about to set, the sky was shining red and orange and she couldn’t tarry if she wanted to reach Meridian soon for some sort of company, after so long.

“Hey, redhead.” Nil’s voice reached her the moment she stepped through the entrance, making her spin around to see him. He was smirking down at her, in the crazy way that he always did, and walking up to her, slung an arm across her shoulders, pulling her carelessly next to him. She grinned wide, and pushed him off, while feeling relief wash off of her back and fill up her lungs. Two weeks ago, she’d never thought that seeing this man’s face would bring her so much joy. She shoved him back playfully, and watched the way that his grin made his eyes shine.

“Forgot my name already, Carja? I thought we were closer than this.” She rose a brow at him, smiling through her joke. Nil rolled his eyes, but played along.

“Honestly, huntress, I’ve never seen you in my life, but you have a bow, and you look ready, so do you want to take on bandit camps with me?” He crossed his heart with both hands together, making it sound like a marriage proposal, and getting a gross laugh out of her. For as loopy as he was, at least his insanity was humorous.

“That sounds like a crazy person’s hobby.”

“So it’s a yes?”

She grinned again, and closed a tight hug around him, hiding her face in the crook of his neck. He was warm under the dying rays of the afternoon sun, and she couldn’t be more glad to have caught him before leaving. Nil wrapped both arms around her and squeezed her against his chest, hard enough to lift her off the ground, and make her push him off to break free. Her exasperated face made him laugh, but she wasn’t angry. If anything, she was gleeful. “Idiot.” She swatted at his upper arm with the back of her hand, playfully rolling her eyes at his immaturity, yet unable to wipe the grin off of her face. She’d never be able to, not with his own grin so wide down at her. It was a curious thing to be his friend, and she was only now coming to terms with that.

“How was Maker’s End?” The playful tone from before had started to even out into something less prevalent, and more serious, mirrored on his face.

She shrugged. “Not bad, but not really what I was looking for, either. It was a lot of arduous work that led to something different than I wanted it to.” She looked over at the sky, at the rapidly setting sun, and decided to have this conversation on the back of a Broadhead instead of stationary here, so she whistled for another mount, for Nil to join her on the road. She climbed onto hers as the second Broadhead strode over. “Do you have immediate business tonight, or will you accompany me down to Meridian?” She watched him raise a brow up at her, then at his mount, as if considering the offer, hesitant as he might’ve been, but eventually approaching the machine with careful steps. He touched its back, then glanced at her wearing a sort of grimace.

“I guess we’re going to Meridian.”

Traveling with Nil ended up being much more reassuring and calming than she ever thought it would be. There were times when she genuinely thought that he’d just ride off without her, but as it turned out, deviating from the path was only how he journeyed. An eccentric man wouldn’t be able to follow a straight line for hours on end without getting bored, and instead riding around her, and going off to the side to inspect a thing or other, and looking up at the sky, and burdening her with questions and tales, endless tales, all to keep himself entertained. When he wasn’t focused on taking down dozens of people, Nil was quite the talker. Aloy didn’t mind that, really. His company was a good one, and he was surprisingly tough to be detected by wild machines, which made the trip a lot less messy than it could’ve been. However, when they couldn’t avoid it, combat wasn’t a problem, since they were both excellent with a bow and arrow. He was truly an honorable companionship.

“Will you be long?” Nil asked her as they arrived, a few days later, at the gates of Sundom’s citadel. She mulled the question over, and decided that, regardless of Erend’s presence at his home, she wouldn’t be long. She just wanted to see him, see his face and maybe kiss his mustache, which shouldn’t delay her trip to the Grave Hoard too much.

“No, I don’t think so. Why?” She looked back at Nil, and watched him shrug absently in response.

“No reason, I just don’t have any business here, and if you were to stay long, I’d scout for the closest camp up for grabs, to make this trip worth something, instead of it just being a waste of time.”

“Well, would you like a recommendation?” She smirked up at him, at the suspicious way that his eyes slit at her question when she spoke it. Despite his obvious skepticism, he didn’t say a thing, so she continued. “There’s a camp, Hollow Fort, pretty close to where I’m headed, so maybe we can make each other company on the way over. If you’d rather stay here, though, I might just take the camp for myself.” Her smirk had become more of a grin at this point, even though the malice in her eyes only grew more visible. Nil watched her warily for a moment, probably trying to figure her out, but not that she was a big mystery.

She liked his company, and traveling by herself for long stretches proved to be quite lonely at times. The ride back with him felt much less like a burden, and more like a field trip, than the way over, that she had ridden alone. Camping felt safer with him, too, and the nights were less lonesome beside him, even if they didn’t actually sleep together. They didn’t even act romantically around each other, and it wasn’t something that Aloy craved at the moment anyway, meaning that the way things were with Nil right now was simply perfect. He was her friend, and acted like one, even when she slipped at that. For the most part, she didn’t come onto him, but sometimes she did feel like kissing him, and did so. He never complained about it or anything, and nothing evolved from it, either, so she supposed that it couldn’t be harmful.

“I didn’t take you for someone capable of blackmail. Well played, huntress.”

“Thanks, Carja. You can go on ahead and I’ll catch up with you later.”

Nil nodded his agreement, and waved her a quick goodbye before heading off east, down the dusty trails of the desert. She watched his back for a moment, then jumped off of her mount and strode into the city through the main entrance, the one with the long bridge and the multiple elevators. She rarely took those herself, but the people who lived down at the valley, she supposed, used them lots. She crossed the bridge, and the market plaza, going straight for Erend’s house near the cliff, where the view was spectacular and the noise wasn’t so much. She could see the palace from here, and wondered if Ersa picked this house on purpose, or if Avad had offered it to the siblings with an agenda. Either way, she knocked on the heavy wooden door and waited for Erend to welcome her.

Except that he didn’t, although his warden was in, and answered for him. That took Aloy a bit by surprise, but she tried not to let it show. She greeted the old woman respectfully and asked after her friend, the owner. The old woman only shook her head at it. “Mr Erend isn’t in town, huntress, and won’t be for a while, but I can tell him that you came by.” Her little eyes watched Aloy carefully, watched the way that her shoulders sagged and disappointment flashed across her face, even if for just a second. Aloy forced a polite smile while backing out.

“No need, but thank you. I’ll come back later.” She didn’t know when, but she would be back, even if it took her two months to do so. This wasn’t a joyful turn of events to what she hoped would be a warm reunion, but she’d take what she could get, and bid the little woman goodbye before leaving.

Catching up with Nil didn’t take long, and soon they were once again riding side-by-side through the desert that dominated this region. He noticed the visible despondency on her face, and how quickly she had met up with him. So quickly, in fact, that had he known of it, he’d have waited for her by the city gates instead. He reached across the small gap between their mounts and laid a hand on her shoulder, to cheer her up and show his support, which she quietly appreciated, but still kept her mouth shut on the matter. She wasn’t sure why, but she didn’t feel like speaking, or even thinking, of Erend at the moment. She only wished to reach Grave Hoard as soon as possible to get this whole Elisabet Sobeck business sorted out already.

Stopping to put up camp that night, and lying next to Nil on the thin mat that they had no other option but to call bed, Aloy couldn’t sleep. She tossed and turned and her mind was filled with Erend, and her chest ached for his presence, and she felt absolutely wretched. It seemed like he was the plague, or some illness that she had caught, and now couldn’t get rid of. Something that was slowly killing her by his lack of presence, and the intensity of her longing for him. She turned to face Nil, sleeping soundly at this point, with his back to her, and poked repeatedly at his spine for attention until he stirred, and yawned, and rolled to lay on his other side. He looked tired, but not angry, and for as much as she felt bad for waking him up, she considered this more of a rewarding bond instead.

“I can’t stop thinking about him.” She whispered.

“Huh?”

“He won’t leave my mind. I can’t think straight during the day and I can’t sleep at night. I miss him, Nil, but I wish that I didn’t. He’s ruining my life. I’m supposed to be worrying over whether or not my mother exists, and yet, here I am, dreaming of him. What’s happening to me?”

“Sounds like you’re in love, kid.”

“What?”

“You can’t stop thinking of him and missing him and wishing to be with him? You’re in love. Good luck with that.”

“In love? But… But that doesn’t make any sense. I barely know him.”

“That hardly matters.”

“You’re crazy. I can’t be in love with Erend Vanguard, that’s ludicrous. I’ve known the man for a week.”

“Call it infatuation, then, if it sounds better to you, but it doesn’t change a thing. It only deepens your denial of fact.”

“Denial of fact… Are you listening to yourself, Nil? You’ve officially gone insane, I’m sorry to say.”

“Sure, Aloy.” Nil turned back around, and burrowed himself further into the covers, nestling the top up to his ears. “Good luck and goodnight.”

It felt as if she would really need it, and much more of it, too. Not only luck, but also something of a sleep-inducive medicine of sorts, if there ever existed such a thing. She sighed, and scooted closer to her mat companion for warmth, burying her nose on the nape of his neck. If her fate was sealed to be madly in love with Erend, then she’d have to find a way to come to terms with it, however much it hindered progress in her personal life, unattached to him. She snaked an arm around Nil and snuggled up to his back. She knew how much of an anti-cuddler he was, but that’d never stop her.

“What makes you so sure that I’m not in love with you instead?”

“I’m not sure of it. I can only ardently, and fervently, hope against it.”

“Why? I thought you liked me.”

“I do, Aloy. I like you a lot, and I’ll defend you against the world, but I like you as a good friend. Maybe even a best friend… But not as a lover. What I feel for you is strongly platonic. Am I breaking your heart, love?” The last question was spoken in a softer tone, as Nil turned his head to pass her a glance over his shoulder. She gave his midriff a reassuring squeeze in return, which probably wasn’t necessary, because he couldn’t have ignored the wide smile that she had pressed on the back of his neck. It was relieving to be on the same page as him, for once.

“Not at all. I guess that explains why you won’t sleep with me.”

“Who said that?”

She laughed, and kissed the sliver of olive skin against her lips. For as dark as it was inside their little tent, it wasn’t enough to conceal the grin on his face, and the good humor in his voice, from her. She might not have had the manual to lasting friendships, or to any at all for that matter, but she could feel deep in her chest that the bond between them was getting closer, and closer, to never breaking. If she only knew that the bloodthirsty Carja psychopath that crossed paths with her once, a good while back, would grow to become her best friend, she wouldn’t have believed it, not even if it had come from her future self.

After traveling through so much desert, their path started to see some vegetation again, and snow, too, the more they climbed up the mountains that segregated the Nora from the rest of the world. Luckily, the ruins that Aloy had to explore weren’t in the Embrace, despite how close to it the way over skirted, bringing back some unpleasant memories from her time in the tribe that forsake her and Rost all of their lives. She could almost see the high walls of the Embrace from here, but not quite; only in her vivid imagination. They slowly, and carefully, climbed the mountain to the other side, always following the path drawn out before them, until emerging over it, where a beautiful, and wide, green forest engulfed the two of them. This place was very close to both of their destinations, and would be their last stop before parting ways.

The moon hung low in the sky above them as they set up camp for the night. It lighted the top of the trees, shone through the gap between leaves and peppered the grass in patches of silver, painting a breathless picture. Aloy did quick work of the tent, then excused herself to go off and find a nice spot for a wide view of the terrain, since it was so strikingly beautiful at this hour. She pushed through the foliage of the forest until reaching a big, open area where Broadheads patrolled far in the distance, coloring the way blue, and something else, perhaps a wild machine, colored the middle of the forest, across from where she stood, orange. She watched that blur of warm light for a moment, expecting it to roam around some before turning blue, but it acted strangely, immobile, almost as if it was a campfire instead. The thought was almost discarded, because barely anybody passed through this area, but that didn’t discourage her. If anything, it only stirred up the curious side of her that pushed her to carefully, and watchfully, cross the site toward it.

The closer she got to the orange glow, the more distinctly she could hear human voices, men chattering and drinking, possibly rejoiced around a campfire? She sneaked through the tall grass, and the thick tree trunks, looking to be as quiet as possible, in case that these were hostile humans, like a group of the Shadow Carja. Her eyes peeked through the grass, and when she was close enough for a good view of the camp, she honestly doubted what she saw. The Vanguard, gathered around the fire, eating and partying, speaking loudly to each other, obviously in their heavily drunken haze. Her first thought was of Erend, and if he could be found piss drunk in the middle of his men, as seemed to be the case with him, quite consistently. Aloy got up from her hiding spot, and approached the clearing, waving amicably at those who paid her any mind. At first, one or two men noticed her presence, and they loudly told the others, until about the entirety of the Oseram Vanguard was messily greeting her with wide grins and red faces, rushing her to join in on the drinking, even if her attention was lost on them. She was fond of these guys, but what her heart really looked for was a pair of blue eyes above a sturdy mustache that, strangely enough, couldn’t be found among them.

“She’s looking for Erend.” One of the Vanguard stated loudly to one of his friends, elbowing them on the side for attention. Aloy could feel her cheeks heat up at the comment, as the other man joined in with the first to taunt her and, much to her chagrin, get more soldiers’ attention to this whole thing.

“The Captain’s in his lodgings, over there. He will _love_ to see you.” The second soldier pointed to a tent a few ways off to the back of the clearing, wearing a snide smirk and bouncing his brows very obnoxiously. That made the other men snicker and laugh, and reminded Aloy of that first night at the tavern with Erend. How much their teasing had flustered him. She didn’t feel like that, though. To her, this was entertaining, and played over something that she hoped to be true. To turn the whole thing around, though, she rolled her eyes, and offered them a few words.

“Of course I’m looking for Erend, he’s my good friend, just like all of you. I’m always happy to see you guys, and thank you for the directions.” She ruffled the second soldier’s hair playfully, as if they were siblings, which made him laugh, and all of the others aw. The Vanguard drunkenly expressed their sympathy and friendship toward her as she made her way across the camp to the Captain’s lodgings, wearing a wide smile on her face.

As not to rudely walk in on him, she kneeled down by the front of the tent and listened. Or, she tried to, if the rejoicing of his men a few feet back wasn’t so loud as to drown out any acute noise that didn’t equal to a cavalry’s. He couldn’t _possibly_ be asleep in these circumstances. “Erend?” She called from outside, still trying to listen in, even if in vain. “Erend, it’s Aloy. Can I--” Before she could finish the question, he had already answered it for her, by drawing the entrance flap open to meet her. This took her quite by surprise, his sudden appearance right in front of her, with blue eyes wide and mesmerizing. She blinked, taken aback, and for a heartbeat, neither of them said a single thing. She only stared at him in shock, and he stared back in similar surprise, before finally backing out to make space for her to enter.

“Aloy, what are you doing here?” He asked as she joined him inside, then carefully fastened the entrance behind herself.

“Truthfully? I was exploring. I’m camping less than a mile away from you, but the Vanguard is being so loud that I came over to see what’s what, afraid that some machine was decimating the lot of you.” She grinned playfully, watching the way that he shook his head at the man under his command, as if disappointed in them, but not heartbroken. This behavior was to be expected, anyway. Her grin widened, and she continued. “Why is the artillery in the middle of nowhere? I’d think Avad would never stand for it, currently fearing for his life and all.”

“We’re on the journey back from… Oseram business, only resting here for the night, whether or not Avad likes it. He has his own Royal Guard to fight for him, and the whole Sundom backing him up. The Carja love him, and the Oseram militia is on his side, so he doesn’t need us there. It’s just his paranoia.”

“He’s a King, Erend. Does he not have influence over you?”

“He has the influence of a friend, and makes the Laws for a piece of land, but I’m not his subordinate. I’m not _from_ there. We worked together to replace his father, and the victory of the Late King’s fall is as much ours as it is his. What he and the Vanguard have is a companionship, but ever since he crowned himself, he’s been in constant fear of the Shadow Carja, and treats us like his personal guard. It’s ridiculous. He has an entire Kingdom of his own, and _I’m_ the one expected to babysit.” Erend shook his head, clicking his tongue at the subject. It made sense, now, to Aloy, the disrespectful way that he had spoken with Avad almost two weeks ago. Truly, if the Vanguard was an independent military, they didn’t necessarily have business with Avad after the war against his father was over. She could understand why he’d like to keep the Vanguard close, though, for personal protection, but wouldn’t he need to hire them for that? She wasn’t sure. Perhaps a talk between friends was all that was needed to settle their differences, since Ersa’s passing had put the Vanguard under a new Captain’s rules, which didn’t have to line up with hers. Whatever agreement as War-Chief that she had with Avad should be revised. This whole thing, however, was none of Aloy’s business, so she kept her mouth shut about it, and only expressed her sympathy with a nod.

“Can I ask what this mysterious Oseram business is?” Trying to change the subject to something that wouldn’t trigger Erend’s anger so much, Aloy offered him an expectant smile, and bumped their shoulders softly together to lighten up the atmosphere. She could see the annoyance in his face from the conversation before dissipate into a less livid, but more somber emotion, that caused him to smile soulfully back at her. That worried her, and she wasn’t sure if the change of subject had been a good one.

“We’re just gathering materials for the funeral. That’s why they’re partying out there.” He indicated the loud Vanguard with a nod. Aloy found that to be a strange sort of mourning, but she wouldn’t criticize the traditions of a tribe. She knew well enough that the Nora had some odd ways of their own; the Proving only a small example. She reached for his hand, resting over his legs, and took it.

“Why aren’t you with them?”

His eyes glanced down at their hands, but she couldn’t read any emotion on them besides deep sorrow. She squeezed his palm, and he held back more firmly. “I don’t know. Guess I just felt like being by myself for once.”

“Should I go?”

At her question, he instantly held her hand tighter, and his eyes snapped back up to meet with hers. “No.” She saw the sincerity in his wide blues, and felt in the grip of his hand how much her company meant to him, which didn’t shock her as much as it reassured his appreciation toward her. He glanced down again, as if to break the unveiled intensity of his earlier reaction, before looking at her again, this time softer, more compassionate, and less possessive. “Stay, please. I’m really glad that you’re here, in the most desolate of all places, with me. After that night, about ten days ago, I honestly thought that I’d never see you again. I thought I had let the best thing of my life walk out of it forever, so you don’t know how happy I am to see you right now. It kind of feels surreal, like I could wake up at any moment.”

“Erend…”

“I’m sorry for being so selfish, drunk and self-involved the whole time you were around. You didn’t deserve to get caught up in any of it. We found Ersa alive because of you, and Dervahl’s plans failed because of you. Do you know how much good you’ve done to me, and to people you don’t even know? How many lives you’ve saved? I should be bowing down to you, Aloy, not acting like a self-imposed idiot. Not treating you like anything short of a Goddess.”

“No, Erend, stop. You and the Vanguard were alongside me during all of that. Maybe I confronted Dervahl before you arrived, but I wouldn’t have found him without the help of your men, the ones you hadn’t drafted. Did you know that? They helped me destroy the blaze shipment that would’ve blown Meridian to pieces.”

“Yeah, they told me about it. They respect you more than they respect me, you know, which is totally understandable. Honest.”

“I’m not above you, Erend. Don’t put me on a pedestal.”

“Will you at least consider my apology?”

“Of course, apology accepted. Now can we go back to being just two fighters who know each other? Because if you call me a Goddess again, I _will_ jab you in the mouth.”

Erend laughed, and Aloy couldn’t help but giggle with him, even though she had meant every single one of those words. He nodded through the last of the fit, grinning beautifully over at her, and with a shine in his eyes that she hadn’t seen in a long time. Maybe he was finally beginning to heal from the loss of his sister, and the funeral would be the closure that he had so steadfastly seeked for, even enlisting her to help, that whole while back. She held his hand tighter, and looking at him, a familiar feeling came back to her, one that filled her lungs up and made her heart beat that much faster. The feeling that she usually had around him, that felt warm like an earnest embrace, and made her never want to leave his side. The same one that, away from him, caused her to so painfully miss him. She suspected what this meant, but it was a terrifying thing, and one that she’d rather leave unnamed, even if Nil was quite right about it.

“I missed you.” He spoke softly, so softly in the small space between them that she could’ve kissed the words off his lips. The thought was a welcoming one, so she leaned closer to him, and would never have missed his smile before meeting it with her own.

“I missed you, too.” She whispered back to him, her lips still brushing his, clinging to the end of the kiss, and having him close the gap again, firmer this time, far more present. He brought a hand up to the back of her neck, and she grabbed the sides of his face in response, eager to taste his tongue, and meet his palate, and never forget how he kissed like sober. There wasn’t much of a difference, only that he was far less sloppy, and a lot firmer with a centered brain, which she deeply appreciated. The absence of brew brought her back to that time in the woods, shielded from the glow of the fire by the trees, and kissing him on her tip-toes when she shouldn’t have. His strong arms around her, squeezing her to his chest then, and lifting her feet off the ground. She smiled at the memory, and slung both arms around his neck, resting atop his broad shoulders as their mouths remained pressed strongly together. His palm on the nape of her neck burned, and she couldn’t wait for him to burn her entire body as well.

Climbing onto his lap and sharing a kiss that hit hard on her lips, Aloy was in bliss. She had one knee on each side of him, and both hands slipping under his thin shirt, feeling up the muscles of his stomach on warm skin. She had missed him, his wide midriff and broad chest and the scars that decorated them. His own hands ran up her thighs, partially hidden under the heavy tassel, and gripped, pulling her close, until her hips were something above his. She grinned into his mouth, and felt down his stomach, to the waistband of his pants, but not paying it any mind, and instead unfastening the belt of her skirt right next to it. She tossed it aside, without breaking from his lips, and bit down on them for emphasis. It was fortunate how Erend, already in his quarters for the night, didn’t have the armor on, so time with it wouldn’t be wasted. As someone sensible to the occasion, Aloy did quick work of removing the rest of her own, including bracers and boots and the protective crop-top alongside many necklaces. She dumped everything aside, and pulled Erend onto the mat.

She loved his weight above her, even if only a portion of it, since he didn’t allow himself to crush her this sober, a behavior well thrown out the window when drunk. His kisses were hard, but not yet enough to bruise her lips much alike last time, and his palms were warm under her shirt, softly running up her sides. She wondered if this would lead him to remember events of the night that he had forgotten, or claimed to have, and if it’d progress to the tipping point of his declaration for her, causing him to remember that, too. She fisted the back of his shirt with a hand, and pulled it up to his neck, making room for herself to touch his exposed skin and feel the marks of battle that dented it. He didn’t care about breaking their kiss only to take it off, and she didn’t care to leave it there either, jumbled up and stuck just above his pectorals, so their mouths remained together and their hands kept on each other, touching and feeling and brushing. He wouldn’t get to her breasts for some reason, as if he were avoiding them, which took her a moment to notice, but when she did, the kiss was finally broken, because her shirt needed to come off.

She pulled it overhead, and he looked at her with wide, shiny blues, too marvelled to keep her from blushing. She rolled her eyes. “Don’t act like you’ve never seen nipples before.” She grabbed his shirt and tugged on it to be taken off, so he moved up to straddle the mat and remove it.

“No, it’s not that. You freaked out about this last time, and I thought… Well.” He motioned vaguely with a hand while dropping his shirt down, letting the end of his argument trail off into nothingness. He looked sheepish, shrugging. “You know.” Before he could dive back down, she sat up to meet with him, below eye level but just high enough to reach up for a peck on the lips.

“We’ve done this before, Erend.” Her voice was soft, but she could see that it still hit him like a slap on the face. He frowned, and didn’t say a thing, only leaned back down for another kiss, one that pushed her back onto the mat. He laid above her, heavier this time around, and when his hands grabbed her breasts, she smiled against his lips. He wasn’t as rough, or as forceful, sober compared to otherwise, and for as much as she had loved the time before, she realized that it wasn’t because of that, and it was really because of him.

To Erend’s standards, and deducing his behavior based on past moments with him, he was being gentle with her. His hands didn’t leave bruises and his teeth didn’t really bite; he kissed her lips and her skin more than nibbled and sucked, which was all different, but not bad. He still grabbed with more force than necessary, and kissed hard enough for their teeth to meet, but comparing this to the time before, it wasn’t even close. Not even _close_ to how rough he had been then. It answered the question that had passed through Aloy’s mind last time, regarding whether or not he had any idea of his own strength. That notion was perfect in his sober brain, allowing him to be precise with it--holding her just firm enough not to bruise and lying above her just short of crushing her entirely--but it was as if the lines blurred when he drank, and killed most of his self-awareness, causing him to hurt without notice of it. He had been good, of course, and she had enjoyed it; he knew from separate experiences all of the right places to touch and squeeze and bite, but compared to now, last time had been very impersonal. She could’ve been anyone, and he would’ve treated somebody else exactly the same way, without remembrance of it. She’d rather not know just how common that truly was for him.

The biggest difference, however, was how much more loving he was being this time around. She couldn’t very well pinpoint exactly what had changed, because everything was strikingly similar, yet nothing was the same. The touch of his hands was softer, the press of his lips was sweeter, and he was ever so present that she could’ve forgotten a time without him. He brought a different sort of warmth to her chest that suffocated her, and had her kissing him for air with the sort of breathless passion that otherwise would’ve destroyed her. She grabbed onto him, not to bruise, but to keep as a haven, steady to not let her drown. His body fit against hers as if they had been made for each other, two pieces of the same puzzle, and she had never been so sure of her affection toward him as she was now. It almost scared her, if she hadn’t already known it, deeply inside herself. She sighed out his name with all of the passion in the world, but her softness promptly died when her orgasm hit, making her teeth split his bottom lip open and her nails cut into his skin. She could feel his fingers digging into her thighs as he kissed her through it, and could positively say that their bond ran deeper than sex.

When he rolled off of her, she almost said it. She caught herself with her tongue between her teeth and ice in her veins. She looked over at him, looked him in the eye, wide-eyed herself and quite frankly in vertigo, almost having jumped off by accident, but his eyes were closed and he missed the look. Probably for good, she told herself. She breathed out the anxiety, keeping the words to herself, in her own heart for now, afraid that if he heard them, it’d scare him off. Afraid that he truly hadn’t meant them when _he_ said them first. She loved him, it was true, but he was too emotionally all over the place to be able to carry this weight right now. She knew that, and she respected it. Telling him wasn’t an immediate urge, anyway, so she’d wait patiently for the right time. As for the moment, she turned to lay on her side, facing him, and kissed him with all of her true feelings for him. Just because she shouldn’t say them didn’t mean that she had to hide them, either, which she wouldn’t. It was heart-warming how he kissed her back just as deeply.

She got up to get dressed and the look on Erend’s face was dismal. “Can’t you stay for a while?” He spoke in a quiet voice, sitting up to touch the cut on his lip. It wasn’t bad, but it was very visible on his pale face, even if most of the blood had been kissed off at this point. Aloy shook her head, slipping her pants on.

“No, I’m leaving early tomorrow morning, and my friend is waiting for me at the camp, so I shouldn’t be long.”

“We’re leaving early, too.” He paused, looking to be working a schedule out in his mind, but not mentioning it. “I don’t think your friend would mind.”

She laughed, putting her shirt on and starting on the necklaces next. “I very much think he would.”

Erend frowned, and for as much as she tried not to stare, she couldn’t help how good he looked, especially with the fresh cut on his lip. She liked it on him more than she should; it gave her a sense of belonging over him that she enjoyed, but would never express out loud. She climbed back onto the mattress to kiss his mouth one last time and feel the dried up blood on her skin.

“I’ll see you again.” She said after the kiss, but it wasn’t enough to cheer him up. He still looked just as desolate.

“Can you promise me that?” His tone was morose, as if he were on death row, but for some reason, the question itself brought a wide grin to her face. A splitting one, accompanied by pure joy, that pushed her to throw both arms around him into a tight hug. It probably seemed like an inappropriate reaction, but she didn’t care. She loved how unafraid he was to express his attachment to her. It made her feelings for him that much more validated.

“Yes, of course. I’ll see you in Meridian after the funeral.” She kissed him again, giddy with joy, when a thought hit her, that caused her to break apart and reconsider. “Wait, _will_ you be back in Meridian?”

“In a couple of weeks, yeah.”

She grinned again. “Wonderful. I’ll see you then.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Been working extensively on my undergraduate thesis, so chapters will be late. :)


	8. The Grave Hoard

Leaving Erend’s tent, for any weak of heart, would’ve been a walk of shame, but to Aloy it felt like walking down the aisle. The Vanguard were still outside, not in its entirety anymore due to the late hour, but enough of them were present to make the hollering and whistling very, _very_ loud. Her face burned out of embarrassment, but she was grinning despite herself, not at all unable to deny or try to play off what had just happened. They all knew, and were right about it, so anything less than taking the cheering into stride would’ve been a waste of time. She waved at the group of men, bidding them all goodnight, and when they referred to her as Mrs Vanguard, she couldn’t help the skip of her heart. It was so dumb, and all of them, herself included, were so incredibly dumb, that she quite liked the ridiculousness of it all. It seemed fitting.

There was a light shining inside of her tent, so Nil should be awake, and she needn’t worry herself to be quiet while going in. Aloy pulled the front open, expecting to find Nil waiting for her, but froze right in place at his sight. He had his bow readied, pointing a sharp arrow at her, which made her blood run cold. When his brain registered who it was, though, he promptly dropped his guard, and put the bow down, although keeping the arrow. From the amount of arrows stacked next to him, it seemed that he had been sharpening en masse while she was away. Aloy sighed in relief, even if her heart still beat a hundred miles per second.

“Hey, Aloy. Welcome back.” Nil’s voice was calm, as if nothing out of the ordinary had just happened, and he didn’t just have a deadly aim on her forehead less than a minute ago. Aloy crawled in and shut the opening behind her.

“You lunatic! You could’ve _killed_ me!” She was legitimately angry at him, more out of lingering fear than anything. She had seen Nil work a bow before, and he was about just as good as herself, which was enough to scare anyone to death.

He didn’t seem appalled by that, though, and continued sharpening the arrow in his hands. “Yeah, but I didn’t.”

“But you _could have_!”

“But I didn’t.”

She groaned out her annoyance, and kicked off her boots. There was no resolving this childish impasse because Nil was the kind of stubborn that could keep this up forever, so she dropped it herself. It didn’t matter, really. She repeated that thought in her mind over and over like a mantra, until her breathing resumed normalcy and she had successfully forgotten about it. Not literally, but in the sense that it truly didn’t quite matter.

“You know what, nevermind. What’s important is that you were right, and that’s all that I wanted to say, so goodnight. Sleep tight.” She laid down next to him and reached for the lantern across his lap to put out the fire. He slapped her hand away.

“I’m working, don’t be rude. What are you talking about?”

“The other night, when you said I liked someone.”

“No; if I remember it right, I said you’re _in love_ with someone. Some Vanguard, I think. There’s a nuance.”

“Yeah, whatever, you were right. Goodnight.”

“No, no, no. You called me crazy, insane, and about a thousand other synonyms when I accused you of that, so what made _you_ frenzied enough to believe me now?”

“I just changed my mind is all. Stop being such an ass.”

“Did you find him in the middle of the damn woods at the edge of nowhere?”

“What?”

“The guy, Prince Vanguard or whoever. Did you run into him _here_? At the end of the world?”

“Maybe. What does it matter? I just said you were right, so drop it!”

Nil grinned knowingly, and she really didn’t like it, so she grabbed the lantern from beside him and put it out before he could retaliate.

The Grave Hoard looked intimidating, being a long deactivated Metal Devil and all, and had all the right to look so, from the amount of Eclipse and machines that it held inside, although knowledge-wise, it didn’t hold much. All that Aloy could acquire from it, after dealing with dozens of the Shadow Carja and even a walking Deathbringer, was that nobody aside from Elisabet and a few selected people in the War Room knew what Project Zero Dawn truly was. The mass population had been given broad and very vague information about it, that required them armed on the front line against the self-replicating Faro machines, all to save time for the Project to be put together and put in motion, and they so fiercely believed in it that thousands of lives were sacrificed to save humanity from extinction. It was an expensive price to pay, but at least it hadn’t been all for naught. Zero Dawn had worked in the end, and even better than Elisabet had expected it to.

The end of the War Room conference had Elisabet on her way to a place called the Orbital Launch Base, which Sylens, as usual, knew the current location of. When he told Aloy where it was, though, she could’ve screamed. She had _just_ crossed the map over, and would have to go all the way back to Sunfall, the capital of the Shadow Carja, for this launch base. As if to make the situation thousands of times worse, by the way, the base wasn’t simply located in the city, but it was right in the Citadel’s palace. She really didn’t like the idea, but Sylens promised to be able to shut down the Eclipse’s Focus network, which should make the whole thing more possible, and bearable, for her. She agreed to it, but of course, to make this happen, she’d have to hold back on Sunfall for now, and head for a remote location across the lake from it first. Still across the map from where she was, though, which _really_ pissed her off, even if she couldn’t do a single thing about it. How wonderful.

Before going anywhere, though, on the way back from the ruins, Aloy stopped by the bandit camp where Nil said he’d be expecting her return. He had successfully taken over it by then, and could be found sitting by the fire in the center atrium of it, if it could even be called that. A few merchants and travelers had started to populate the place already, which was a good sign. Aloy approached her friend, but instead of taking a seat by him, tapped his shoulder with her boot for attention.

“C’mon, let’s get out of here.” She indicated her point with a nod of the head toward the entrance arch, and watched as Nil got up to his feet. The look in his face wasn’t a particularly joyful one.

“Where to? I’ve nothing to do here. Not anymore.” He sounded desolate for some reason that she didn’t understand, and his words didn’t really land. She frowned in confusion.

“Exactly, Nil. That’s why we’re leaving.”

“No, I mean I’m done here. I’m done with this whole place, this entire piece of land, and all of the claims that we know. There are no more camps closeby, Aloy. I think… It’s time to leave.”

“What? No. No, hold on now. Wait just a second here, let’s think about that. I mean, where will you even go?”

“Maybe south, where it’s warmer. Somewhere new is sure to have some outlaws for me to chase down.”

“Okay, that’s an idea, or… Instead of doing that, you could just get a new hobby, and stay here. It’ll be less of a hassle, too.”

Nil scoffed, smiling a bit, but she couldn’t grasp the humor of a situation like this. At least the look that he gave her was endearing. “That’s cute, but it’s not how it works. There aren’t many lawful hobbies out there that have you killing people on a whim without someone after you to make sure you pay for murder.”

“But isn’t that what the army is? Lawful murder?”

“I was a soldier of the Late Sun King, Aloy. I don’t think the new regime will want me there.”

“Oh, I’m sure Avad can squeeze you in. He’s a very understanding guy.  And if anything, maybe Erend can get you into the Vanguard, even. I mean, I don’t know. He _might_. It’s worth a shot. I can talk to him for you.”

Nil squinted his eyes, as if considering the idea, but not liking it a whole lot. Aloy took his hand, and started back to the exit of the camp, where their mounts were waiting for them just outside. He followed.

“Look, Nil, you don’t have to decide anything right now, but just think about it. Give it some time, okay?” She glanced up at him with a pleading look, which only got suspicion out of him in return. He surely was onto her, but that didn’t matter. Her point still stood, even if her charmingly deceitful personality didn’t get him. “While you think it over, why don’t you come on a ride with me?”

“Where to this time?” He spoke through an exaggerated groan that made her laugh.

“Somewhere distant… Far away… That’s all I can tell you. And maybe, on the way there, we can stop to have a word with Avad. We’ll see what happens.”

Nil was awfully quiet for most of the ride back to Meridian, when he usually was talkative and lively, too restless to delve into his own thoughts too much, or for too long, but not this time, which was a strange change to Aloy. He still chatted with her about empty topics that never got anywhere, just for the fun of it, and to kill time during the journey, but when these conversations died, he fell silent again, and the look on his face was far too centered to be nonchalant. At least it seemed that he had been considering her offer, if perhaps considering it too deeply. He didn’t look cheerful about it, but for as long as he didn’t leave forever, she didn’t care if he liked staying or not, because she wouldn’t let him go. Not him, too.

He had been brewing a response and final decision for a while now, but for as much as she knew about that, she still dreaded the moment that he decided to tell. They were a few hours from Meridian by then, and would reach the Citadel first thing in the morning. The camp was set up, the mat was rolled out, and the lamp was on when he turned to her, and she just knew. Her heart leapt for her throat, and she grabbed his face in both hands, frowning up at him before he even said a word. The frown on his forehead softened, and he managed a small smile in reply. “What are you freaking out about?” He spoke in a soft whisper that made her already start to miss him, and frown harder.

“I know what you’re going to say.”

He raised a challenging brow. “And what’s that?”

“You’re leaving.”

“Yeah, but not forever. I’m sorry, Aloy, but you can’t keep me here. My business in this land is done, and I must part ways with you. I know that you’re deathly afraid of being alone, so I’ll have you know that while I’m alive, you have someone that you can count on. I’ll be there to listen to your boy troubles and make you company whenever you need me. It’s not like I’ll never see you again, silly.”

“Then why does it feel like it is?”

Nil shrugged, at an honest loss for an answer. “I don’t know, but I don’t think it has to do with me. I think it’s something inside of you.”

For as much as she hated to admit it, he was right. She knew that he’d come back, and that he wasn’t abandoning her, but all of her past experiences with goodbyes had been tearful, and tragic ones that had only brought her ruin. Being shunned from the tribe, losing Rost, and losing the brief, and only friends that she had ever made… It hadn’t been easy to get past all of that, especially considering that most of it had happened at the Proving. The attack had been so fast and so inhumanely that the memories of it dug deep scars into her heart still to this day, several months later. The pain was dull by now, but never gone. It was the only thing that had stuck to her side all this time.

Aloy wrapped both arms around Nil’s neck and pulled him down into a strong hug, strong enough to almost suffocate him where he knelt. She could feel her heart breaking, even if she logically knew that this didn’t mean the loss of a friend, but the maintenance of one. Nil would go on to do what he loved, and would be back to tell her of all the people that he so heartwarmingly killed. Plus, she’d get some time to work on herself, too; work through this heavy dependence that she had on other people, and sort it all out. Maybe she’d be a more mature and developed person by the time he came back.

“Where can I look for you, if I need you?”

“I don’t have an answer to that, so let me come to you, for once.”

“Okay, I’ll see you next week then.”

“Hm, maybe not so soon, yeah? How about in ten weeks?”

“... Okay… Ten weeks. I can make that.”

The final goodbyes after sunrise actually got her teary-eyed, despite how much she promised herself the night before that she wouldn’t cry over his departure. He’d be _back_. Still, her eyes betrayed her and spilled and she couldn’t help but wipe at her cheeks and have Nil hug her longer for it. He kissed the top of her head before letting go, and since this was about the twentieth hug that she had made him give her, she settled on the conclusion that it was enough. She wiped at her eyes one last time, and got up on her mount, watching him do the same on his, bid his farewells for the third time, and finally turn to leave. As he galloped away, she found that this must be what a true friendship looked like. Two people who ran their own lives separately, without holding each other back, and despite their busy schedules, still made time for the other.

Aloy continued the journey to the Eclipse base by herself, and went on to get it done with as soon as was possible, but not without Sylen’s help. He guided her way through the base, having insider knowledge of it for some suspicious reason, which she tried arguing about, but failed. He wouldn’t have it then, and only dispatched her to go crash the network already, so she sneaked in through the back of the base and got passed dozens of the Eclipse and their machines to get to the Tallneck that he had indicated. It was a struggle to get to, but that was because she didn’t know what was to come. Hades was there, a huge Metal Devil that had her as its primary target, and it saw her. It called her Entity, as if it was her codename, but she was quick to keep it from harming her, and stuck her spear in the Tallneck that connected to it. The network crashed, but Hades had already informed all of the Eclipse and the machines of her presence. The Tallneck was shot down, and fire rained from the sky to burn her alive as she ran for her life.

It was a narrow escape that had her shaking when in safety, and hugging herself tight to keep from crumbling onto the ground. Her life had flashed before her eyes, and the red of the sky was so terrifying that, for a moment, she had been sure that it was her end. Aloy leaned on the wall for support, and took a second to breathe. Only breathe, slowly and focusedly, until Sylens appeared in front of her like a damn nightmare. She wanted to strangle him with her bare hands. “You _knew_ Hades was there and you _sent me_ to him?!” She was livid, even if her hands still shook, and her legs threatened to give. She was terrified, but more importantly, her insides burned with anger. Sylens, apathetic as he always was, didn’t seem moved by it. He stood by the choice that they had made, clearly because it hadn’t been his life at risk. It was infuriating.

They argued, Aloy nearly broke truce with him, but in the end, it was true that they both needed each other to see this whole Project Zero Dawn mystery through, so she’d have to put up with his lack of sympathy for a while longer, and try not to die in the process, which had been proving hard to do as of late. Sylens left with the promise to contact her once she reached Sunfall, and once again it dawned on her just how alone she truly was, when the only person that she had talked to in the last few days was a hologram. Upsetting, but not the end of the world, because Nil would be back in less than ten weeks, and Erend was to meet with her in Meridian after the funeral. She told herself that she’d settle business with Sunfall first, and then head for Meridian next.


	9. Deep Secrets of The Earth

For a Shadow Carja domain, Sunfall was far less aggressive at first glance than Aloy honestly thought it’d be. She strutted up the Palace’s stairs in all of her Nora garb without trouble, explored the wares of merchants and the open spaces of the Carja and the various stairways leading up to the inner Palace, all the while dozens of guards watched her, in their posts, doing much of nothing to stop her. Perhaps the network crash did work, and this passive entrance into the Citadel was the result of it. Nice work, she told herself, strutting by the guards and following a few outlanders to an inner room where an authority of sorts spoke. 

A little boy and his mother sat in a higher platform inside, above the spokesperson and the other outlanders that filled the room, and when the boy gave the spokesperson permission to speak for him, a woman that had been standing by Aloy whispered her disagreement under her breath, but clearly loud enough for Aloy to hear. She tried to not comment on it, and focused on what the official had to say instead. This Shadow Carja woman, however, insisted in making small talk during the speech, which Aloy really didn’t care to participate in, thus tried her best to ignore it. Her silence must’ve struck a cord, because the woman soon gave up chit-chatting, and moved to leave. She proposed to meet with Aloy later, outside of the palace, for some real talk that, apparently, would interest her, and left right after. That intrigued Aloy, and the woman’s absence was more distracting than the words pouring out of the Shadow Carja official’s mouth, to the point that Aloy was past grasping the point being made, and turned to leave as well. 

She didn’t know that following Vanasha out of the Citadel would lead to such a long, and highly vital, detour. They got to know each other a little better, and Aloy met Vanasha’s friend in the mountains, if the man could be considered such, before getting to aid on the escape of the little boy and his mother, seen before at the Sunfall Palace. The whole ordeal was exactly that, and more of a life-risking, dangerous detour than just a simple hassle. Aloy fought more machines than she ever thought would be necessary, and smeared the healing essence of herbal flowers on her skin with such frequency that, when all the fighting was done, it felt strange to spend a few hours without feeling  _ some _ sort of pain. They successfully opened up a safe path for the mother and child to escape the terrible mistreatment of Sunfall, and reach the lands of the Sundom, ready to protect them. 

During this whole time, Aloy hadn’t put together that the little boy was Avad’s younger brother, or perhaps half-brother, so seeing Avad come to welcome them both to his territory was more than just surprising to her. Avad surely hadn’t mentioned having a brother before, and much less one that had been left behind with his mother in enemy possession, or Aloy would’ve remembered something as tragic as that. If he had been having trouble with family, he could’ve asked for Aloy’s assistance in person, and so perhaps the rescue would’ve been done much sooner.

After welcoming his family home, Avad turned to Aloy, looked her in the eye, and thanked her sincerely for having saved them. She was quite speechless from all of it, and could barely say a word before he was already turning to leave. He seemed too somber for what should’ve been a heartwarming family reunion, but before Aloy could really think that over, Vanasha was quick to express her dissatisfaction at his choice of words. Truthfully, it wasn’t fair of Avad to  _ only _ thank Aloy, seeing as the whole thing was Vanasha’s idea in the first place, and without her, or the help of her soldiers, Aloy would never have made it. She wouldn’t even have known that the boy and his mother were Avad’s relatives at all, or that they needed rescuing. Vanasha seemed upset for half a second, but moved on from it as quickly as she had gotten mad, and thanked Aloy for her assistance. It was brief, which Vanasha had complete conscience of, so she promised to thank Aloy more thoroughly once they met again. She spoke in a dubious tone that got Aloy suspicious, then left with her friend, perhaps associate, to go on with their business. 

After their exit, Aloy looked for Avad, and was glad to see that he hadn’t gone too far yet. He was escorting his brother and mother, or maybe stepmother, to an unknown location, one that hadn’t been disclosed to Aloy, when she stopped to think twice before engaging them again. For as much as it was gratifying, and honestly relieving, to see one of her few friends after so long, Avad was clearly busy with his family, and the administration of his Sundom, and probably didn’t have time for a hug and a hello from her. It was good enough to see his face, which was all that Aloy truly needed for now, so she quietly wished him good fortune, and took the raft back to Sunfall. 

The ruins underneath the Shadow Carja Citadel, for once, offered the answer to a few questions more than only further confusion. There was no hope for the civilization of the Old Ones, and they all truly went extinct, but with the creation of Gaia, and all of its fully automated, self-creating branches, the Faro robots would be put a stop to, and life on Earth would be born anew. That was Project Zero Dawn, except that it didn’t quite work exactly how Elisabet had programmed it to. The Apollo branch, responsible for teaching the new human life about the civilization of the Old Ones, had failed to do so, and Hades, somehow, had been created, targeting Aloy for whatever reason, and wanting to see her dead. Sylens didn’t have answers to this, either, so Aloy would have to continue her investigations past these ruins to find out more.

It was shocking to know that Aloy herself, and all of the people that she knew, were the results of creations from a software, a machine; Gaia. It also confirmed Aloy’s dreadful suppositions of Elisabet not being her mother at all, and her not having a mother in the first place. Everybody had parents at this point, meaning that the selection of humans created by Gaia was an old one, who had already succeeded in repopulating the Earth, so why was she found at All-Mother, with no parents to claim her own? If these two facts correlated, then perhaps she was supposed to be one of the first breed of human beings, made by Gaia, thus parentless. But if so, then why had she been created so late, instead of surfacing with her fellow first-generations? It didn’t make sense. There must’ve been some sort of malfunction with Gaia’s programming, which wouldn’t be surprising, given that Zero Dawn didn’t fully work as intended. 

The deeper Aloy ventured into the vault, the more Eclipse soldiers she encountered, and had to deal with. They seemed never-ending, just dozens of them in every other room, blocking her path forward, unfortunately standing between her and the highly important answers about this reality that they all lived in. She engaged the soldiers, putting them down one by one, until reaching Elisabet’s office, where the master file laid bare, and perfectly intact. It would grant her access to the insides of All-Mother, with no malfunctions this time, and in there she would finally learn the truth behind her birth. If it was truly a machine who had created her, or, perhaps, even a human being, somehow. All possibilities ran freely through her brain as the file copied, but it didn’t take long for the moment to be interrupted by the man who had ruined her life. The bastard who had attacked the Proving and killed Rost, rendering her completely, and utterly, alone. He appeared outside a window, hanging from a piece of rope of sorts, and tossed a bomb in her direction. 

When she woke up, she was in a cage, stripped of her armor and weapons, as Helis spoke of fateful nonsense to her, in a condescending tone that truly disgusted her. She honestly considered spitting at his feet, but ultimately decided against it, and instead, would humor him with his blabbering, even if only for a moment. She had the opportunity to call him an idiot, straight to his face, and seized it, but it didn’t do much to stop his nonsense. The only thing that spit out of his mouth and got her attention was his order to murder every single Nora while searching for her. He had found her by accident, but wouldn’t be able to call his men back from the slaughter even if he wanted to, not without the Focus network. Aloy was enraged, and were she able to hit him from here, she would have. As it was, fate had other plans for her, and decided to drop her down in the arena below, where a corrupted Behemoth stormed about. She had never seen her life flash before her eyes so quickly. 

Hadn’t it been for the joined forces of Sylens and her own genius, she would’ve been blasted to death without a moment’s hesitation. By forcing the Behemoth to headbutt the pillars of the Sun Ring like a damn fool, she managed to get her armor and weapons back, all the while unknowingly buying Sylens time to bust in and bail her out. She managed to get a few good hits on the Behemoth and actually kill it before that happened, but she wouldn’t have been able to defeat the two Corruptors that followed. They outnumbered her, and were much faster than her, which was worrying, and had her desperately scrambling for a good plan. Fortunately, though, that was when Sylens showed up with a few machines that handled the situation without problem. He galloped right in, accompanied by a free Strider, which she promptly jumped onto as soon as it was within reach. They left as an angry Helis shouted from above. 

Outside of Sunfall and at a safe distance from it, she exchanged a few words with Sylens, but it didn’t do much to answer her questions about him, because he refused to answer, as if he loved being a walking mystery. She didn’t put up a fight, too tired from the ring and still a little shaken from such a narrow escape from death, so he said a couple of nice words and left soon after. She watched him gallop away while hugging herself, the shock of the whole thing only now starting to fully sink in. That had been terrifying, defenselessly staring a Behemoth right in the face from so up close, and actually losing all hope for a second there, when the Corruptors had already closed too much ground on her. She held herself steady, and waited until her heart stopped pounding so fast and her hands stopped shaking too bad. 

She needed company, and she needed it  _ now _ . She’d ride all the way down to the south if she had to, but lucky for her, someone else was much closer than that. A few hundred miles northwest, in fact, where a beloved someone’s funeral should have just been. She grabbed the Strider by the neck wires and turned it toward the Claim, whipping her ankles onto its sides to make it run like the wind. 

Aloy had never been to Mainspring, or any of the clans in the Claim, really, only heard stories about the Oseram and how much they loved their timber, though they all failed to mention just how beautiful their land was. It looked quite lonely from being located so far away from any other settlement of significant size, but the vast collection of forests and wide open greens made it stand out beautifully atop the mountain. She saw the silhouette of a castle first, far away in the horizon, and followed it through the forests and woods and pastures, as a beacon, pointing her straight to Erend. Truth was that she wasn’t even sure if he was still in the Claim for the funeral, or in Mainspring for that matter, if he was even  _ from _ there, but she had to start somewhere, and surely, if the Vanguard had made history saving all of the Claim from being completely engulfed by the Eclipse, Erend’s name was to be known throughout his own land. It was only logical. 

Arriving in Mainspring, she was welcomed by a couple of familiar soldiers, who seemed very surprised to see her. Two of the Vanguard that had been to many a few adventures with her pointed her to the castle far up the mountain, saying that Erend was in there, and she had arrived just in time, too, because they were scheduled to leave by the morrow. She sighed, relieved, and thanked the two, before hopping off the Strider and walking into the Citadel. 

The journey through the town and up the mountain ended up being a much easier time for her than it looked to be, maybe because she had so much to see, from the many merchants with interesting and different wares to sell, to the numerous houses with gorgeous architectures in display, and so many of the Vanguard to greet here and there as well, that made it simply impossible to get bored on the meanwhile. Still, she was glad to finally be standing in front of the castle gates, and free to walk in without being barred. There were a number of guards past the moat, but they didn’t mind her straight up sauntering in, so she didn’t waste her time trying to figure out why. She walked right in, through the long courtyard and toward the keep, where more guards stood by the entrance, and actually stopped her this time. She had been expecting this, and didn’t mind it at all, only explained that she had come to speak with Erend. A small man, probably the courier, took her message to the authorities, and soon came back with word to allow her entry. She thanked him, and followed his lead inside. 

She saw Erend from across the entrance hall, and never had he looked so princely before. He was descending the ridiculously big, but gorgeously decorated, mahogany stairs, when their eyes met, and made him stop for a second. She wasn’t moving, either, stuck right in front of the big double doors, with eyes trained on his, as if enchanted. All air left her lungs, and the room, but only for a moment. Her feet started to move her forward, slowly at first, but soon picking up pace, and before she knew it, she was running to him at full speed, and jumping onto his chest with both arms closing around his wide shoulders. It was an aggressive hug, and had he been any less sturdy, they would’ve both fallen to the ground, but he caught her with little trouble, and squeezed her into his arms as strongly as they had missed each other. 

Lost in all of her exuberance, she found herself drawing back and kissing him full on the mouth, in front of the entirety of the keep. She would only have noticed this sort of carelessness if he had made a point of it, but since he kissed her back with just as much zest, she was too engulfed within the moment to see it from the outside. It felt right, kissing his smile while suspended in the air by his arms, and she would’ve done it again, given the chance. She pulled back, grinning wide, and matching the absolute joy on his face with the one in her heart. She had missed him  _ so much _ , even if it had only been a few weeks; a feeling probably intensified from her upsetting lack of friendly contact all this time, but made right by her journey over. 

He finally put her back down, and as the rose-colored moment wore off, she realized that the castle staff had been staring at them, which should’ve been embarrassing, by all means, but her attention was snatched away from it too soon for her to really have that sink in. Erend took her hand, making her look at his face, still grinning handsomely, and as the world turned pink at the edges, he led her up the rest of the stairs. 

“What are you doing here, Aloy?” He asked her once they were inside a private study of sorts, pushing the door closed behind the two of them. It was gorgeous, as was the entrance hall, and fully decorated with heavy, wooden furniture detailed in brass. A few decorative weapons hung on the walls, and thick rugs covered most portions of the floor, causing her to consider taking her boots off, but deciding against it. 

She turned to look at him, and after all this time, his sight still made her heart skip a beat. She smiled. “I figured you were still in the Claim, so I came to visit.” 

Erend raised a suspicious brow at her, doubting her reasons, but still too glad about her presence to be able to wipe the smile off his face. “Is that all?”

“Well, yes… And no.” She walked over to him, closing the distance between them so she could touch the armor piece covering his chest. She traced some of the lines with her fingers before looking up to meet with his blue eyes. “I really need you by my side.” Her voice was ushered in a whisper as they looked at each other over the following silence; him easily reading the sincerity off of her, and her being reassured of his steadfast devotion. His brows furrowed, but he didn’t say a word, so she continued. “I can’t keep doing this alone, Erend. It’s heartbreaking. Everything that I’ve ever had has been taken away from me; my home, my story, even my best friend, my… My…” She stopped herself short and shook her head, trying not to let all of the hurt from losing Rost flourish back anew with the memories. It was tough, but she pushed forward. “Making the journey back to the Embrace as the Eclipse destroy it will be too much, Erend. I can’t watch it go up in flames, and if I do, I don’t know if I’ll have the strength to save it.” 

“The Eclipse?” Erend’s brows creased deeper with his newfound, and quite sudden, anger. He had personally watched the Eclipse attempt at burning his own homeland down, so she believed that he, better than anyone, understood what she was feeling at the moment. “They’re attacking the Nora?” 

“Yes, just as we speak. Helis sent his men there in hopes of finding me, but everything ended up a mess.” 

“That disgusting, slithering snake. Why is he looking for you?” 

She shook her head again, really not harboring enough energy to get into all of it, so a brief summary would have to do. “His superior, Hades, is targeting me for some reason, but, look, Erend, that doesn’t matter. It’s not why I came here. I’m here because I’d like you to journey across the land with me, and be at my side should the Embrace still stand. I feel like we’re already too late, but I might be wrong, and they can still use of a couple of skilled fighters like us. So, please, can you do this for me?” 

Erend took her elbows and stared deep into her eyes, with his brows knit tightly together out of seriousness. “Of course, Aloy. I’ll follow you to the center of the Earth.” 

She touched the side of his face, then leaned up to press the lightest, most gentle kiss on his lips. “Thank you.” When she opened her eyes to look at him again, his face had changed entirely. Where before he was a perfect warlord pleading allegiance to the nation, now he wore the gentle look of heartfelt emotion. It was obvious that he worried for her, and had second thoughts about the emotionally taxing journey ahead of them, but it was something that had to get done with, in one way or another. At least with his physical presence beside her, she’d have someone to rely on. She smiled, watching the zealous softness in his eyes. “We’ve come pretty far, don’t you think?”

“Hm?”

“When I first met you, all of those months ago at Mother’s Heart, I never thought that…” She trailed off as words escaped her, gesturing vaguely with a hand in hopes of their return; reaching for the nuance that she wanted to express, but to no avail. There was no lightweight way of saying what she wanted to say, and she was very hesitant about using impactful words, which had her only shaking her head in dismissal instead. 

“You never thought that what? That I’d be so charming and interesting?” He raised a mischievous brow and coupled it with a smirk that made her scoff, but unable to stop grinning. 

“I just never thought that I’d get the chance to know you, is all.” 

“Yeah, I know what you mean. I liked you from the moment I saw you, and that was before I even knew how incredible you are. That you can literally save a whole nation by yourself, and travel the land with enough power to lay Thunderjaws at your feet. I’m honestly honored to even be talking to you right now.”

“Oh, please.”

“Take an honest compliment, Aloy. You’re worth far more than you think.” 

“Stop it. I was trying to tell you something, but you completely stole the spotlight! How can you do that so easily?” 

“Sorry, I talk a lot. I didn’t mean to derail the topic--” 

“No, I mean, how can you talk your feelings so easily? I have trouble saying the obvious about someone.”

“Huh.” He paused, and pondered her question over for a second, before coming up completely empty. “I don’t know. I didn’t know you struggled with that.” 

“Haven’t you noticed that I’ve never said a single nice thing about you the whole time that we’ve known each other? When in truth you’re… You’re much more important to me than I’ve led you to believe.” 

“Really? Why do I feel on top of the world every time you’re next to me, then?” 

“That’s just because you like me. Look, this isn’t the point.” She stepped closer to him, loosely wrapping her arms around his waist as his hands found her sides. “Erend, my hometown is burning to ashes. Every ungrateful Nora that I’ve ever known is being brutally murdered. The little hut that I used to call home all of my life is no more. Rost’s grave… The only sacred thing inside of the Embrace is probably already debris, but despite all of this loss, none of it affects me when I’m with you. It might be selfish of me to wish it, but if I could keep you for myself, I would. You bring me companionship in a way that I’ve never felt it before. There’s something about you, about the way that we connect, that draws me to you. It makes me miss you when you’re not around, and drives me eight hours northwest looking for you. It’s so powerful, Erend. Do you feel it, too?” 

A very heartfelt and sincere smile graced his lips during her speech, softening his eyes with a loving charm that had her entranced, unable to tear herself away from his arms. She felt the warmth of his body radiate through the armor, and their casual closeness couldn’t be more appreciated. It was this kind of interaction that she so dearly treasured, and by the looks of it, so did he. His eyes visibly read the words that he had once drunkenly mumbled to her months ago, even if he didn’t remember them. Except that, this time, she didn’t run away from them. 

“Yes. I know exactly what you’re talking about.” 

She smiled, and looking at his face, she thought to herself just how lucky she was to have met someone like him. 


	10. The Heart of The Nora

“Are we leaving for the Embrace tonight?” Erend asked, joining her out on the balcony. The setting sun, far in the distance, cast long shadows behind the mountains of Mainspring, and colored Erend’s eyes in gold. They shone when he looked at her.

“I heard from the Vanguard that you were to depart first thing in the morning, so we can do that instead.”

“Should they come with us?”

“That might be prudent.” Aloy took his hand, and interlaced their fingers, as the last few minutes of sunlight kissed their skin. “How come you’re here, in a fortress?”

“His and Her Majesty are having me over for the funeral. They were very close to Ersa… She saved their lives, after all.”

Aloy nodded solemnly before lifting their hands to her lips, and kissing his knuckles. He smiled at her, so she kissed that, too.

It was freeing to be able to be this close to Erend without having to worry about prying eyes, or setting an example for the soldiers, or the dangerous assumptions of any passing stranger. He didn’t seem to have cared that the entirety of the keep saw their romantic re-encounter, and the very openly shared kiss, so maybe he had changed his mind about what they had between them. Where before he saw their affection toward each other as something damaging to his public figure, now he seemed to be thinking differently. Either that, or earlier was only an exception. If, during their embrace, she had briefly forgotten that the world around them hadn’t ceased to exist, he might’ve been caught in the same situation.

At least, that was what she thought, until they engaged the Vanguard in the next morning, to tell them of the change of plans. She stood next to Erend as he briefed the soldiers, unable to keep from grinning at the knowing glances that she had been getting from them, when Erend said something that had her heart skipping a beat, and her cheeks packing some color. “From now on, you will respond to Aloy, as well. Her orders are as good as mine, and shall be followed as if she carried the title of War-Chief herself. Understood?” The Vanguard was all too willing to agree with this new sort of joined leadership shared between the two of them, and set for the Embrace at once, without a single inquiry about it. She seemed to be the only one who wasn’t entirely clear on that.

“So I can tell your men what to do now?” She whispered to Erend as they marched outside of the Citadel gates, scooting closer to his side for that. He went along with it.

“Yes. I trust your better judgement.” He whispered back, keeping his eyes forward, but leaning closer to her for better hearing.

“We should’ve discussed this before leaving the keep.”

“Why?”

“Because I looked really dumb in front of everyone! It shouldn’t have been a surprise to _me_.”

Erend tried his best to keep from laughing, but wasn’t very good at it. “Look, I’m sorry. I’ll discuss everything with you first from now on, yeah?”

“Thank you.” Aloy immediately stopped in her tracks, and turned to face the Vanguard, that was following right behind them. She held up a hand, making them all halt in their places. “Wait here. There’s something I’ve been meaning to do.” With that, she went off to the closest Broadhead site, not two hundred paces from where they stood, and overrode every last one of the machines as the whole Vanguard watched in awe. She climbed atop one, and looked back at them. “C’mon, boys. _This_ is how you travel great distances.”

Once they all had claimed a mount, two soldiers on each machine, they set off once again toward the Embrace, this time efficiently, and right behind Aloy’s lead. Erend soon fell in step beside her, pulling their mounts close for a private conversation, whispered quite aggressively over to her. “You know that thing about discussing decisions before suddenly taking them? Let’s do that for real.”

She laughed, shoving him playfully on the arm. “Yeah, let’s do that.”

Organizing a clean riding formation with the Vanguard on mounts was something of an art form in itself, that started very sloppily, but took some shape with time, the more ground they covered together. It was clear that they needed a while to get acquainted with the machines and their power, but fortunately it didn’t take them too terribly long to figure out how to stay in a decent formation to ride as a group, following leaders. The men of the Vanguard weren’t the sharpest learners, but managed to get the basics down quick, and before even reaching Meridian, they had all fallen into a comfortable rhythm, worthy of an independent militia.

Aloy found this new leadership arrangement to be… Nice. She traveled beside Erend, and had an army of dangerous men carrying deadly weapons follow the two of them on killer machines like a small family of ducklings. It was kind of cute, really. It made her feel responsible, for once in her life. Responsible not only for herself, but for the future of these men, too, as they all rode toward the attack of the Embrace alongside her. She wondered if Erend felt the same about being the new Vanguard Captain.

Meridian was located in the way from the Claim to the Embrace, so they all decided to stop there by nightfall to rest and restock.

“Did you know that Avad has a brother?” Aloy commented as they crossed the Citadel to Erend’s place. The Vanguard quickly dissipated to certain bars and motels, rendering the two of them alone mere moments after passing through the city gates.

“Yes, little Itamen. He and his mother had to be left behind during the battle to regain Meridian.”

“Well, don’t worry. They’re both in the Sundom now. I helped Vanasha rescue them not long ago.”

“Really?” Erend grinned brilliantly. “I’m starting to believe that you’re not from this Earth, Aloy, but was put here to fix everything. What would the Sundom be without you?”

His words, so oddly chosen, had Aloy thinking, because maybe he wasn’t wrong. Maybe Gaia purposefully delayed her “birth,” knowing that she’d have a bigger part to play _now_ rather than during the time that her fellow first-gens repopulated the world, so long ago. It would also explain why her genes were so alike Elisabet’s, if Gaia had the purpose to make them look alike from the beginning, so Aloy would be able to open the doors to the ruins that nobody else could access. All this time, she was supposed to encounter the ruins, be drawn to them, and go on to find out all about the old civilization, Elisabet, Zero Dawn, and the creation of the Faro Robots. It had been written in her destiny.

“Aloy?”

Erend’s voice snapped her back to reality, making her look at him. “Yeah, you’re right.”

He grinned. “I’m happy to see you finally taking a compliment.”

The inside of Erend’s house brought back memories of their first drunken encounter, so messy and absurd, but that had been the first starting flame, which soon had her heart in wildfire for him. What a fateful evening, to have reached Meridian for countless other reasons than Erend Vanguard, and yet have crossed paths with him in such a meaningful way, to the point of having her life quite changed by it. Aloy could safely say that whatever wonderful thing she had with Erend now, she owed it to Olin and his Focus for having sent her over.

“Have you spoken with Olin lately?” She asked Erend as he tended to the pile of mail received during the time that he was gone. His warden had neatly stacked the letters for him on one of the furniture pieces that decorated the entrance hall.

“That traitor? No, and he better not show his treacherous face anywhere near Meridian, for his own sake.”

“You know that he didn’t _want_ to be a spy, right? He was being blackmailed. His family was being held hostage, Erend.”

“I know, but I can’t help feeling betrayed by him. He used me and Ersa to provide our enemies with intel. There’s nothing lower than that.” He flipped through the letters in his hands, reading out the sender addresses, when one of them made him pause. He plucked it from the bundle, and handed it to Aloy. “If you’re so interested to hear from him, then here. It’s the third letter he’s sent me ever since fleeing Meridian. You can have it.”

Aloy took it hesitantly. “He’s been trying to contact you...? Have you written back?”

“Of course not. I trashed the other two without even opening them.”

She glanced down at the envelope in her hands, clearly not addressed to her, but at Erend’s authorization, teared the top open.

The tone of the letter was friendly, as Olin apologized in it for his unclean intentions with those who he, for so long, had considered to be his closest friends. He expressed worry that the other two letters had failed to reach Erend, and hoped that this was the cause of his lack of response, rather than a sign of something dreadful. The end of their friendship, perhaps, which had been so dear to him, for the longest time. He hoped that Erend would forgive him, and come visit his family sometime, out in the fields. Olin reassured that he wasn’t going back to Meridian, in fear that the others of the Vanguard would remind him of the errors that he had committed in the past, and thus left his house as a gift to Erend.

“He gave you his house.”

Erend frowned. “What?”

“It says it right here that he’s not coming back, so he’s giving his house to you. The one that you broke the door down.”

“That really complicates things. Avad’s been meaning to give that house to you instead.”

It was Aloy’s turn to frown. “Why?”

“Because you deserve to live in the uppity side of Meridian with the rest of us.”

“Can he do that? Just… Give someone else’s things to other people?”

“I believe the Kingdom can appropriate anything that’s been abandoned by its previous owner, and since we haven’t seen Olin for so long, I guess Avad just took it.”

She made a face. “That doesn’t sound right, but either way, Olin passed it onto you, so it’s not really abandoned.”

“Yeah, I don’t know. We’ll have to consult Avad on that, but I hope you can have it, because you deserve it, and I honestly don’t want it. I mean, I’ve been meaning to move somewhere smaller and without so many memories of Ersa in it, but Olin’s house being under my name wouldn’t solve anything in regards to that.”

“Well… That lot is pretty small. Maybe you can demolish the house and build a new one in its place?”

“It’d rather leave it to you, so you can have your own property in Meridian.”

“Erend, you know I don’t care about that.”

“Maybe you don’t, but it doesn’t change the fact that after you find whatever it is that you’re looking for right now, and all of the searching and fighting and traveling is over, you’ll need someplace to come back to. You need somewhere to call home.”

She knew that his intention was good, but his words still stung. They cut her right through the chest, and drew a blank in her brain, leaving her unable to respond right away. He was right, though. He was absolutely right, and for as much as she tried to ignore that, or run from it, or occupy herself with other matters, nothing changed the fact that she didn’t belong anywhere. She had no place to call hers, or anyone to go home to. No _home_ to go back to. It was upsetting, crippling so, but she couldn’t help it. She couldn’t fix it.

He noticed how deep his words had cut, and his features softened immediately after the realization, with how guilty he felt from having said them. He stepped closer to her, extinguishing the gap between them, and enveloped her in a tight hug to express his redemption. She loved the warmth of his big arms around her, and how strongly they held her against him, pushing her nose to the crook of his neck, as her own arms snaked around his waist.

She felt a kiss to the top of her head, and his arms squeezing her impossibly closer. “I’m sorry.”

“No, don’t be. You’re right, I just… I don’t even know where to begin to make that happen.”

“We can go to Avad tomorrow. Maybe he’ll give the house to both of us.”

“How will that help?”

Erend shrugged. She felt it against her own torso rather than saw it. “We can build a new house in its place, and share it. It might not feel like home, but it’s somewhere to go back to. It’s a start.”

“Both of us, living together?”

“Yes.” Erend pulled back a bit, the enough for their eyes to meet. “What do you think?”

Her heart doubled up in size as she smiled. “I think it’s a great idea.”

Just like Erend had promised, they went to Avad by morning, to pay him a quick visit before the Vanguard was scheduled to depart. He had been sitting on one of the many ottomans that decorated the Palace when they approached, and grinned wide at their sight. “Aloy! Erend! My favored fighters. It’s relieving to see you two back in the Sundom.” He spoke while getting up from his seat, and walking over to greet the two of them with a warm handshake.

“Yeah, but we’re not staying long. The Nora tribe is being attacked, and we have to…” Erend paused briefly to glance at Aloy, as if expecting some sort of signal from her, to allow him to continue. She decided to cut him off instead.

“Avad, we’re here to settle matters regarding Olin’s propriety here in Meridian. Taking this letter into account, which he sent to Erend a few days ago, it clearly states that he wishes to pass his house onto Erend’s name.” She handed him the letter, pointing to the paragraph of interest for him to read.

Avad frowned down at the sheet in his hands, reading and re-reading the outlined section a few times over before speaking. “Yes… Yes. I see it.”

“Haven’t you appropriated the lot already, though?” Erend jumped in.

“Yes, about a week ago, which dates the appropriation in a time before this letter was written. I’m afraid he no longer owns the propriety to be able to gift it, but… As the Head of Government, I can fulfill his wishes regardless, and pass Olin’s previous house, from the Sundom, onto you, Erend.”

“Yeah, about that…”

“We have a better idea.” Aloy cut in, then checked herself. “Um, if Your Majesty would be willing to listen.”

“Yes, of course. Anything for my two best soldiers.”

She glanced over to Erend, and at his nod, she took the lead. “We were discussing this last night, and decided that, instead of writing the lot under Erend’s name alone, we could share it between the two of us, like a joined custody.”

Avad raised a brow, passing a glance between the two of them. “You two wish to own this house… Together?”

“Yes.” They both replied in union.

The King still looked skeptical for half a second longer, before breaking into a full knowing smirk. “That can be arranged.”

Reading and signing the propriety papers took a minute, but the two managed to do it rather quickly, allowing them enough time to make it back to the Citadel gates, to meet with the awaiting Vanguard, without much of a delay. All the while over, Aloy couldn’t remove Avad’s smirk from her head.

It took the Vanguard four to five days to arrive at the Embrace on their mounts, which was no time at all, if compared to the two weeks that it would’ve taken them to cross the map on foot. The closer they got to it, the clearer the smoke rising up at the skies started to become, and how much of it there was. The Embrace had been burned to the ground, but the Eclipse still patrolled the sites alongside their machines even after the slaughter. They easily outnumbered the Vanguard, so sneaking through the tall grass and the trees was a much surer way to worm themselves in than facing off with what would probably be their death. The smoke made it difficult to see, but Aloy didn’t need her eyes to successfully navigate through the land that she knew on the back of her hand. Human corpses and machine parts littered the ground in a series of paintings of the Nora defeat, all across the Embrace, as they continued to push through. It was heartbreaking.

Arriving up at the top of the mountain, they encountered a corrupted Thunderjaw surrounded by the Eclipse, attacking the hiding place of the last Nora survivors. Aloy was both shocked, and relieved, to see that there were survivors at all here, and proceeded to dash toward them with a battlecry for the Vanguard to follow. Re-encountering Sona and Varl, up and fighting to the bitter end, filled Aloy with purpose, and fueled her to aim her shots very precisely at the Thunderjaw, as well as dig her spear into the Eclipse soldiers without holding back. It was invigorating to fight alongside her peers, and see the Vanguard in collaboration with the Braves to kill every last standing Eclipse soldier.

After their victory, the Braves thanked them dearly, and Varl rushed Aloy to the inside of All-Mother, to speak with the matriarchs. The surviving population had been taking shelter in there, by Teersa’s word, breaking one of the primordial rules in order to survive. Common sense to Aloy, but not always to the Nora. She thanked Varl, and had the Vanguard follow her inside.

The matriarchs didn’t particularly enjoy her return, but Teersa encouraged her to speak with All-Mother again anyway, perhaps to try a different result this time around. She had told Aloy to cleanse herself of the corruption, or something, last they were here, and now that Aloy had the master file necessary to fix this door and allow her entry, she took Teersa’s invitation to engage All-Mother a second time.

To the surprise of the Nora, the door opened, but before going in, Aloy turned to speak with Erend and the Vanguard. She told them to wait for her out here, and that she’d be back soon. It was safe inside, she was sure of it. They all nodded their unquestioned understanding at that, so she entered the vault.

These ruins were where the first generation of children was born, and raised, to repopulate the planet from scratch. Drawings colored the walls, and cribs and little playgrounds made the place. It was also where Apollo was located, intended to educate these children about the old civilization, but as Aloy found out, the system had some sort of error in it, that prevented it from working. She walked up to an office, where Gaia awaited her, hoping to figure out everything that she could about this vault, and ending up having some important questions about herself answered instead. In the presentation, Gaia confirmed everything that Aloy had been trying to piece together for herself, about her own birth, and her purpose on Earth. It was true that she had been created in the image of Elisabet Sobeck, in order to be able to access all of this locked out information, and find a way to annihilate Hades. She was the result of a code in a machine, and was here to fix what Elisabet couldn’t. Gaia gave her the location of the master override that would kill Hades before bidding farewell.

Aloy felt her knees weaken, and needed a moment to breathe.

Back outside, she managed to answer some of Teersa’s questions as best as she could without getting too technical about it, which ended with all of the Nora bowing down to her, calling her anointed, as if she were some sort of deity. It was outrageous. They acted like lunatics, praising her for literally no reason, when minutes ago they didn’t even want her back. They had shunned her from the tribe all of her life, and now bowed to her as a Goddess. Ridiculous. She pulled them up from the floor, raising her voice to chastise them for this infuriating behavior. She lectured them, more as a way for herself to let out steam than to bring sense into their heads, but it made them slowly resign the bowing anyway, and make way for her to pass through. She was still livid, but would let it die organically with time.

Erend and the Vanguard were pushed to the side, waiting for her by the wall, very unsure of how to behave before all of this. This sort of religious reaction to her return from All-Mother didn’t make a lick of sense to them, and all that they could do about it was pass each other confused glances that didn’t get them anywhere. Aloy was just glad to see that they hadn’t bowed down or anything, and went over to them.

“Come on, we’re leaving.” She spoke curtly to all of them, then took Erend’s hand, holding onto it firmly in case that he should try to shake her off. He didn’t, though. He provided her with the physical support that she needed at the moment without a single objection to it. “We have somewhere else to visit before Meridian.”

As the Vanguard followed the two of them out, leading the way hand-in-hand, Erend decided to have some of the confusion cleared up, since he wasn’t very acquainted with the ways of the Nora. “What was all of that?” He spoke in a whisper, to make sure that they wouldn’t be overheard.

“Which part, the door that’s a Goddess or the sudden worshipping?”

He gestured vaguely with his free hand. “Everything.”

“The Nora created a religion out of this deactivated Metal Devil, that they call All-Mother, and since I ‘spoke’ to her,” Aloy quoted the word with her fingers in the air, “I’m suddenly the anointed now, no matter how much they despised me for nineteen years. It’s ridiculous.”

“I’m sorry to say, but your tribe doesn’t deserve you.”

She shrugged. “They don’t want me, and I don’t want them, either, so it’s an agreement.”

“Excuse me, Captain.” One of the Vanguard approached them, making the two turn around to face him. He had been referring to Aloy, his eyes clearly on her face, and on second thought, she wondered why she had answered so promptly to Erend’s title. “Where are we headed to next? The boys are curious.” 

“We’re going to the Bitter Climb, retrieve the weapon to purge Hades with."

Her answer looked satisfactory enough for the moment, with the men behind her nodding their agreement, and setting out to the North.


	11. The Final Chapter

At nightfall, after saving what was left of the Nora tribe, they set up camp in one of the desolate settlements, where the buildings had been destroyed, debris covered the ground, and the people who couldn’t have managed to flee from the attack laid dead where their demise had met them. The Vanguard cleaned out a clearing for a campfire to be put up, so they could rest around it in their respective tents. None of them had much of an appetite from all of the corpses stacked up to the side, though, and ended up retreating to bed early. 

“What happened inside the ruins?” Erend asked her once inside their own tent, zipping up the entrance behind himself. 

Aloy offered him a noncommittal gesture. “It’s quite a long story, if you want to understand all that really happened. I mean, I can tell it to you, but it might change the way you see me as a person.” 

“What do you mean?” 

“I mean… You might start to look at me differently, because I’m not like everybody else that you know. Remember that I told you, a good long while ago, that I was looking for my mother?” 

“Yes, you said that Olin knew her, or something.” 

“Well…” 

Telling Erend of the origin of her birth, and her purpose for being put on this Earth manually by Gaia, with the likeness of an ancient scientist, and global heroine, wasn’t easy. He listened to her with surprising attention, though, obviously trying his best to keep up with her storytelling, but still having to interrupt her here and there to make a fundamental question or two about topics so clear to her, that she quite forgot his upbringing didn’t include him scavenging into ruins or wearing a Focus since he was a child. She managed to explain Project Zero Dawn to him, and Elisabet’s existence, and all of her deeds to save humanity, as well as creating Gaia and, with that, Hades. Apparently. Aloy still wasn’t exactly sure how Hades came to be, or why Apollo harbored such a fatal error, but she could feel that these questions were very close to being answered, perhaps up at the Bitter Climb. 

“Erend, I know we told the Vanguard that they’re coming with us to the Bitter Climb, but on second thought… They might be more useful back in Meridian, with Sona’s War Party. Perhaps they can travel together, fend for each other.” 

“Are you sure?”

“Yes. Two of us up in the ruins is enough, and the knowledge we are to obtain there won’t make any sense to them. It’s best that they await for us in the Sundom.” 

Erend nodded. “You make a point… Very well.” 

They broke the news to the Vanguard by morning, and met up with Sona’s War Party before parting ways with them. She wasn’t exactly overjoyed to travel alongside the Vanguard, but seeing that they were on mounts, and were overall very skilled fighters, Sona ended up having to agree with this turn of events. Aloy wished them a safe journey and left with Erend, headed to the ruins up north. 

The two of them rode past dozens of dangerous machines, striking them down on the way, but never stopping long, as not to waste time. They rode through the desert, and a forest, and the furthest they got, the colder the air became, until the forest gradually turned into a frozen tundra, inhabited by no human life, only devious machines. Both of them climbed a great deal of the mountain, via the footholds and ropes that Sylens had apparently left for them, and it didn’t take longer than four days for both to arrive at the very top, where Sylens’ workshop was located. Admittedly, it was a strange and desolate place for someone to work at, but then again, Aloy couldn’t say that it didn’t fit him pretty well, for the hermit that he was. 

These ruins were a hazardous wreck, with pieces of the Metal Devil hanging by a thread, and the facility of the Old Ones more resembling a pile of debris now than somewhere once inhabitable by living, breathing, human beings. It was strange to think that people actually used to live here, with the way that things looked to be now, covered in snow and stalactites everywhere, but it surely must’ve been much different back then, so many centuries ago. The two of them ventured into the vaults, passing through debris and busted up holes, trying to gather as much information from the environment as was possible. 

They eventually came to a conference room, where a sort of remembrance monument for Elisabet was located. The hologram file told of her sacrifice to save the project, literally launching herself into the chaotic world outside in order to manually close the hatch, and protect Gaia, as well as all of the Alphas inside. It was a shock to hear of her last deeds, her sacrifice, and eventual death. Aloy knew that she hadn’t survived until the dawn of the new world, and couldn’t possibly still be living, but it was still heartbreaking to hear her last words through the hologram. 

In a different conference room, a group of people laid dead around a big circular desk. The Alphas who ran the project from the inside, and raised Gaia to see her functioning properly, to Elisabet’s orders. The ones who she had sacrificed herself to save. The hologram showed Ted Faro, admitting to be responsible for purging Apollo, and then proceeding to murder every single Alpha, in order to not have his decision reversed, and Apollo back in working order. It was awful to see the holograms of the Alphas asphyxiating to death, and falling to the ground, where their corpses still lay. Aloy circled the conference desk morosely, paying her respects to the lot of them, and took the master override that rested by the control panel. 

Back to Sylens’ workshop, and in a surprising turn of events, they both encountered him there, in the flesh. He said that this was best to be done face to face, and proceeded to take a moment to tell them his story. He was the one who had found Hades, served it, and helped it build the Eclipse from scratch, all in return for knowledge. He had eventually turned on Hades, though, and had been on the run ever since his kill order was broadcast to all of the Eclipse, for having outlived his usefulness. Hades didn’t need him anymore, and now was focused on the Spire, Gaia’s creation responsible for coding the machines. If Hades were ever able to touch the Spire, it would have full control to reawaken the deactivated war machines that had taken over the Old World before, so long ago, and nearly caused all life on Earth to be extinct. It could wipe out all of humanity all over again, if it so desired to. And it did.

Erend wasn’t at all pleased to hear that this man was responsible for the birth of his enemies, the very ones who had threatened to take his homeland, as well as Meridian, but Aloy managed to keep him from violently engaging Sylens at the moment. This wasn’t the time to argue over the past, but instead to move quickly and avoid Hades from destroying the world a second time. They had to work together now, not against each other, and time was of the essence. As Sylens bid his farewell, both Aloy and Erend set for Meridian. 

The Vanguard, alongside Sona’s War Party, had arrived before them, and communicated Aloy’s orders to the King. They still weren’t sure what they were readying themselves for, but that soon changed when the two of them reached the Palace. They told of the inevitable attack, and whatever else they could manage to explain to Avad without getting into too much detail, the enough for him to understand the situation, and how dangerous it was. Blameless Marad, the head of Meridian’s defenses, took it upon himself to speak to the war parties and see to them that they were in place. He also mentioned something about irregulars, who had decided to aid them on the war. Aloy would never refuse a friendly hand, and went check on the lines of defense with Erend right alongside her, for the last preparations. 

Quite a few people that Aloy had come across during her journey were waiting at the Ridge, to protect it against the Eclipse invasion. These irregulars, that Marad had called them, were happy to see Aloy before the fight, and were steadfast about defending Meridian with her. It was really heartwarming to hear their support for Aloy, and the Sundom, and how glad they were to be here, to be useful for the wellbeing of all. It brought a smile to Aloy’s face, and a good feeling in her chest, one that she hadn’t felt in a while. One that confirmed to her that these weren’t just acquaintances of hers. No, people who stood by someone and fought beside them to the end were more than that. They were her friends, and she’d never have to fight Hades alone. 

Sona’s War Party and the Vanguard were at the top of the mountain, already in place to protect the Spire. They were glad to see Aloy before all Hell broke loose, and yet, for as warm as was her welcome, Aloy couldn’t ignore the tinge of sadness that it also held. The Nora weren’t happy away from their Sacred Land, and the Vanguard was anxious about the size of the war. No one here had participated in a battle of such massive scale, but they didn’t look afraid, either, only unsure of what to expect. Unsure of what to be ready for. She patted the Vanguard on the back, and thanked them for always having been there for her, every time she had needed them. 

“Of course,” one of Erend’s men said simply, “You’re family.” 

Aloy grinned. For someone who had felt abandoned all of her life, she surely didn’t feel like so anymore, not tonight, on the brink of a spectacular war. She turned to Erend, with a finger pointed at the Vanguard soldier. “I like this one. We should keep him.” That made them all laugh.

On the way back to downtown Meridian, for their well deserved rest before the fight, Erend decided to clear the last of the details with her. 

“We don’t know from which side they’re going to strike. It might even be from both, so the artillery must be on their toes at all times, all around Meridian. I’ll be up in the mountain with the Vanguard, defending the Spire. We will fend Hades off to the best of our abilities, but you must get to it before it breaks through our defense. Do you know what it looks like? And how you’ll stop it?” 

“I don’t know what it looks like, but I will when I see it. And yes.” She unsheathed Sylens’ spear, and showed the override to Erend, where she had attached it. “I will bring it down with this.” 

He inspected it with furrowed brows, nodding pensively. “Yes… As Sylens had instructed.” Their eyes met then, and in his she could read steadfast conviction like she had never seen on anyone before. “I know we can do this, Aloy. We can stop Hades. You can kill it.” 

She nodded. “I know. Its demise is close.” 

The following morning arose with smoke in the sky, coming from the west. A Royal soldier banged on Erend’s door violently, waking the both of them to his shouting and the King’s orders to take position. They both got up and got dressed very quickly, armed to the teeth, before bolting out the door with weapons in hand. Erend was headed toward the Spire to join the Vanguard, while Aloy was being summoned to the Palace by the King, but before Erend could slip away, she took his arm. She pulled him back and kissed him in the middle of the chaos in Meridian’s marketplace, both in parting, and as a promise to be reunited with him again. They shared an understanding look afterwards, then hurried to their respective positions. 

From up in the Palace, beside nervous Avad, Aloy could see from where the Deathbringers and Corruptors were coming from, and where they were headed, a whole army of them. She ordered the soldiers to take position with the guns, which they complied, after a brief moment of standing around in shock. Just as they were descending the Palace stairs, though, the side of the building was attacked, having a hole carved into it, where Helis, appearing from the black smoke, wormed into. His presence honestly pissed Aloy off, so she rappelled down behind him, despite Avad’s shouting for her not to do so. 

Facing Helis, and quite a few dozen of his men, wasn’t easy, but Aloy was fueled by enough anger to last a lifetime, which pushed her to hunt every last one of them down with their demise. It was an insane idea, tougher to execute than previously imagined, but she managed through it perfectly fine, with only a few burns and cuts here and there, which weren’t very important. What was important was seeing Helis fall, and sticking her spear far into his ribcage to make sure that he stayed that way forever. 

After facing off with Helis, and laying his death, Aloy ziplined down to the Ridge, where the machines were attacking. Defending it was no easy task. The Oseram Cannons gave them an incredible help, but still weren’t enough of a successful upperhand in the battle. They fought valiantly, holding down the fort for a long time, until a Deathbringer managed to blast its way through, and knock Aloy unconscious. 

When she came to, Meridian was up in flames. 

She ran to the Spire. Every fiber in her being burned and ached as she bolted across the village, as fast as her body would take her. Machines were obviously in the way, but Uthid and his men managed to take care of them, reassuring her that they’d have her back so she could keep on running. They covered very well for her through the thickest of it, and even when they couldn’t, Aloy managed to duck and dodge enough machines to get up to the Spire with the speed of a lioness. 

Before she reached the top, though, Hades’ transmission began. She saw the broadcast tower being activated, and transmitting the waves that would reawaken the ancient machines, buried all throughout the land. Hades had taken control of the Spire, meaning that it had broken through the defense, the Vanguard and the Nora. Aloy’s heart raced, and ached, as she climbed up to the top of the mountain. 

It was excruciating. The more debris she encountered, and fallen pieces that she had to go around, and broken bridges that she had to leap through, the worse her body ached. The more her chest constrained, and the harder it became to breathe. She ran and jumped and climbed, wheezing something awful, and with the desperation of a million people. She couldn’t bear to see them dead. Her friends, her closest friends, the people who would fight for her, and with her, to the very end. Erend… She kept on running until her lungs burned, her eyes shed tears, and her body refused to stop. 

She did come to a stop, though, right when she reached the very last survivors of Hades’ breakthrough. Her eyes spotted Erend first, but it was already too late for her feet to stop on their own, which rendered her crashing face-first onto his metal breastplate. He caught her with two strong arms around her shoulders, and two feet firmly planted on the ground. She could finally,  _ finally _ breathe, and her relief was such, that the first thing that she could do, as an instinctive reaction, was to sob right into him. 

“Aloy.” He spoke above her, holding her tighter against himself. “We thought you had fallen at the Ridge.” 

She shook her head, and turned to glance at the very few others who had escaped Hades’ attack with their lives. It was a relief to see Varl, and a few of the Vanguard, but her heart sunk at the loss of Sona. She couldn’t imagine what Varl must’ve been going through. “No, the Ridge fell on me.” She breathlessly addressed this to all of them, even if her body couldn’t bring itself to let go of Erend. Not after what just happened, not yet. 

The transmission echoed above them, through the skies, causing them all to look at it. “We don’t have much time.” She spoke airily, before finally untangling herself from Erend’s arms. “We must stop Hades. Now.” 

Up in the arena, Hades spoke to her. It had foreseen her approach, and awakened a Deathbringer to stand between the two of them, and stop her at all costs. Unfortunately for Hades, though, Aloy didn’t only have raw skill and determination, but she also had friends on her side.

The last of them fought the Deathbringer with everything that they had, and still it was a real challenge to defeat. Its metal was tough, and it hit hard, with exploding projectiles, lasers and melee attacks that turned the battle into a very serious one. They gave it their best, and chopped away a good chunk of its health, until Hades decided to spice things up by adding a few more, although smaller, machines into the ring. The Vanguard took care of them, mostly, while Aloy and Varl shot at the Deathbringer. After this wave, Hades brought even more machines into the ring, bigger ones this time, that ended up being everyone’s concern, and a distraction from the Deathbringer, which, in itself, already was a distraction from Hades. The whole show made Aloy furious, and had her fighting as fiercely as she had never seen herself before. 

It took time, effort and skill, but they all managed to bring every last one of the machines down together. Aloy was relieved, but didn’t spend a single second relishing this momentaneous peace, and ran straight for Hades’ core, to purge it, once and for all. She stuck Sylens’ spear into it, deactivated the extinction protocol, and watched as the tower transmitted waves of peace back into the ancient machines, putting them back into eternal slumber. Only then did she, and the rest of her friends, began the celebration. 

They climbed around the mountain, where some trees and bushes colored it green, and raised their weapons at Meridian’s Palace, to showcase their victory to the King, Blameless Marad, and everybody else. Erend laid a hand on her shoulder, Varl shot her a proud look, and the very few remaining soldiers shouted their celebration at the top of their lungs. Aloy breathed in big, and let the reality of this moment fully sink in. The true victory against Hades, the salvation of humanity, and the prosperity of the Earth. Such big achievements almost felt surreal, but the people who loved her, and had fought beside her, had made it a reality. Aloy turned to Erend and hugged him, listening to the loud cheers of the soldiers around them, congratulating her, each other and everybody across the canyon who had fought valiantly in Meridian. She grinned into his breastplate, finally experiencing how it felt to belong somewhere.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading. :)


End file.
